Final 2023 ratings round-up
Having looked at each Driver of the Weekend individually, it's time to finish off with some overall figures - starting with the averages for each of the 22 drivers who took part over course of the season:
| Pos | Average | Driver | Team |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 9.39 | Max Verstappen | Red Bull |
| 2 | 8.07 | Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes |
| 3 | 7.8 | George Russell | Mercedes |
| 4 | 7.77 | Lando Norris | McLaren |
| 5 | 7.75 | Charles Leclerc | Ferrari |
| 6 | 7.7 | Fernando Alonso | Aston Martin |
| 7 | 7.5 | Carlos Sainz | Ferrari |
| 8 | 7.36 | Alex Albon | Williams |
| 9 | 7.3 | Oscar Piastri | McLaren |
| 10 | 7.2 | Pierre Gasly | Alpine |
| 11 | 7.2 | Liam Lawson | AlphaTauri |
| 12 | 7.05 | Sergio Perez | Red Bull |
| 13 | 7.05 | Esteban Ocon | Alpine |
| 14 | 6.43 | Yuki Tsunoda | AlphaTauri |
| 15 | 6.43 | Daniel Ricciardo | AlphaTauri |
| 16 | 6.3 | Lance Stroll | Aston Martin |
| 17 | 6.07 | Zhou Guanyu | Alfa Romeo |
| 18 | 6.05 | Nico Hulkenberg | Haas |
| 19 | 5.98 | Valtteri Bottas | Alfa Romeo |
| 20 | 5.59 | Logan Sargeant | Williams |
| 21 | 5.52 | Kevin Magnussen | Haas |
| 22 | 5.05 | Nyck de Vries | AlphaTauri |
It was always going to be Verstappen who came out on top of course, anything else would mean that we'd have to fire our ratings team for being criminally irresponsible and palpably negligent in their season's work! The fact that his average for the season is over 9.0 - a full point ahead of the driver in second - also speaks volumes.
However it's a bit of a surprise to see Hamilton and Russell as best of the rest. The reason appears to be that they had a consistently underperforming car but for the most part the two drivers managed to pull off some good damage control and disaster recovery, so that when they failed on Saturday then would hunker down and sill manage to deliver a strong result on Sunday.
In any case, just one tenth of a point covered Russell, Norris, Leclerc and Alonso, which is nothing over the course of a full season. All four delivered a lot of entertainment and were frequently stars of the show, so this all seems appropriate and apt.
Sainz should probably be in there with them, but his consistency hasn't been there to the same extent as Leclerc which explains why he's slightly dropped away from the others despite his stand-out win in Singapore. After that is another close gaggle of drivers consisting of Albon, Piastri, Gasly and Lawson, although the latter's average is over just five races which rather obfuscates the overall comparison.
Perez ties with Ocon, which might feel a bit rough on the Mexican given he was runner-up in the driver's championships, but his 2023 was the story of an even stronger season squandered. After that it's surprising that AlphaTauri team mates Tsunoda and Ricciardo are tied, although again it should be noted that the latter's average was over seven races while Tsunoda did the whole 22.
Total Driver of the Weekend nods
If you haven't been keeping count of how many times each driver has won the F1i ratings Driver of the Weekend title, we have you covered.
It will come as little surprise that Verstappen was the top rated driver in a whopping half of this season's races, 11 out of 22 once the tie breaks have been applied.
Alonso, Norris and Perez all came out on top in two races: Alonso in Bahrain and Canada; Norris in Britain and Brazil; and Perez in Saudi Arabia and Azerbaijan (the two races he won).
Norris' McLaren team mate Piastri was our top driver in Qatar while Hamilton, Leclerc and Ocon also came top in one race apiece (USA, Vegas and Monaco respectively). And of course, Sainz was very much the hero of the hour in Singapore as the only non-Red Bull race winner of the season.
Perfect ten tally
We try and reserve our 'ten out of ten' ratings for very special occasions and make them a rare accolade indeed. This year we handed out just seven in the 22 races, slightly under a third of the season.
Three of them went to Verstappen and to be honest it could have easily been double that number such was his impressive form almost every week. The races where he absolutely couldn't be denied were Spain, Austria and Japan.
The other perfect tens this season went to Alonso (Bahrain), Norris (Britain), Sainz (Singapore of course) and Piastri (for his brilliant Qatar breakthrough).
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