Yuki Tsunoda (SP18, P10, 1 pt): 7/10
Yuki Tsunoda will have been very happy to come away from Spa-Francorchamps with a point in his pocket, his first since the Azerbaijan GP at the end of April. It reasserts his claim to be team leader at AlphaTauri over young whippersnapper Daniel Ricciardo, at least. The Japanese star was impressive in Friday's qualifying session where he came within a whisker of getting through to the top ten pole shoot-out round, but less so in the Showdown where he fell short of the first cut and started the Sprint from 16th, five places behind Ricciardo. An error at the restart following Fernando Alonso's spin did him no favours, and while there was no damage it was effectively the end of his race. "That was my goal: to keep the car intact for Sunday," he admitted. And just as well he did, because that 11th place grid position saw him run inside the top ten for all but two laps in the Grand Prix on a straightforward medium/medium/soft two-stop strategy that worked out well for Tsunoda.
Lance Stroll (SP11, P9, 2 pts): 6/10
Aston Martin continue to struggle through their mid-season slump, having lost ground to their rivals such as as McLaren in recent outings. Spa saw much of the same for both Lance Stroll and Fernando Alonso: in qualifying, they both made it through to the final round but settled for P10 and P9 respectively. They fell short in the Showdown and were eliminated at the end of the second round, after Stroll was the first to risk (and rue) a move to slick tyres which saw him crash into the barriers, leaving him lining up for the Sprint in 14th. When Alonso spun out of the Sprint on lap 3, Stroll was left flying the racing green banner but poor visibility and a lack of general pace from the AMR23 left him unable to make much of an impression. He opted for a long first run on mediums for the Grand Prix, expecting the rain to play more of a role mid-race, and he was disappointed when it proved to be a light, short shower. He was up to fifth at one point before pitting on lap 20 for softs, and admitted later that the one stop strategy had been the wrong call.
