Yuki Tsunoda, RB (SP13, P14): 6/10
Everyone was hailing Yuki Tsunoda finding his form at the start of the season and for showing his RB team mate Daniel Ricciardo a clean pair of heels in the first races. But that's slowly slipped away and the last few races have not shown Yuki at his best. He qualified and finished ahead of Ricciardo in the Sprint but never at any time looked like troubling the top ten. He made it through to the second round of Grand Prix qualifying on Saturday but finished several places behind Ricciardo. While the Australian made an early stop, Tsunoda went for a longer first stint and didn't pit until lap 21 which left him behind the likes of Zhou Guanyu and Alex Albon. His second stop cemented him in 15th place for the final laps, although Albon's post-race penalty put him ahead of Williams in the final classification. It's nothing that he's going to look back on with any pleasure though. We'll gloss over the unfortunate matter of his use of inappropriate language over the RB team radio, and the 40,000 euro penalty handed out by the stewards.
Lance Stroll, Aston Martin (SP10, P13): 6/10
Aston Martin is having a very rough time of it at the moment, and things didn't get any better this week in Spielberg with neither Lance Stroll nor his team mate Fernando Alonso able to do much to lift the car's flagging performance on track. Of the two drivers, Stroll was definitely in better form in Austria, in the top ten in first (and only) practice and out-qualifying Alonso for the Sprint where he finished five places ahead of the two-time champion. Alonso had the better qualifying session for the Grand Prix only to have a messy race with a penalty for running into Zhou Guanyu, the kind of stumble we wouldn't have expected from someone of his experience and calibre. Stroll by contrast just got on with the job, no drama but no real sparkle, and accordingly no points. But he has his new contract with Aston warming his back pocket, and for this week at least that was sufficient.
