We are already writing the tenth driver ranking for Formula 1 2024, and it has taken a really long time for Lewis Hamilton. Before today, Hamilton had only two tenth places in the ranking to his name. The lack of results caused all the dams to break on the Internet with conspiracy theories about discrimination.
The Spanish GP was desperately needed. George Russell qualified out, but finished on the podium in the race – discrimination looks different. In the ranking of Motorsport-Magazin.com Hamilton, who was once a permanent guest at the top and a regular contender for victory, gets his first top-5 result of the year. But he is actually worse in the rankings than in the race.
Not only Max Verstappen & Lando Norris beat Hamilton
The winner is of course not surprisingly Max Verstappen. He is in a class of his own at the moment, even if he missed pole by 20 thousandths. This is also reflected in an average score of 1.23 in Barcelona. Lando Norris did a lot of things right, but was not able to assert himself sufficiently at the start. All in all, a very good race, but not a perfect one. The editors only gave him a score of 1.33 and the readers 1.89, and an overall average of 1.61.
The MSM audience was prepared to put Hamilton in third place. With a reader rating of 1.96, he was almost ahead of Norris. The editors, however, had other ideas, with three twos. For at least two editors, there was one driver who was better than Hamilton in Barcelona. Namely Alpine driver Pierre Gasly!
Thanks to the editorial note, Gasly narrowly jumps past Hamilton and prevents him from achieving his first podium finish of the season. George Russell completes the top five with an overall average of 2.15. Poor Ferrari performances mean that Charles Leclerc falls back to seventh place behind Nico Hülkenberg.
Problem Perez almost last again in Barcelona
Gasly has every reason to celebrate after Barcelona. Also because he almost held off Sergio Perez on the track. Making it to Q3 was hardly impressive, and neither was his race. The next five-pointer from the editorial team was quickly wiped out. In the overall average, Perez only narrowly avoided the second last place in a row with a time of 4.68.
Logan Sargeant, who is delivering his usual program for Williams, takes it for the third time this year. Oscar Piastri, who was particularly disappointing in qualifying, was only able to escape the bottom of the rankings to a limited extent with an average of 4.02. Readers were prepared to show mercy with a score of 3.38, but the editors took tough action with two fives and one four.
Race in Spain: Strategy showdown only partially convincing
After Barcelona, readers and editors were relatively unanimous in their rating of the race. The majority gave it a two or three. This Grand Prix was not particularly convincing, even with two pit stops, a strenuous fightback from Norris and two sensational maneuvers from George Russell. Somehow, all the tension kept falling flat, and in the end Norris never came close enough to create any real action.
- Readers’ rating race: 2.46
- MSM-Note Race: 2.67
- Overall race score: 2.56
Driver ranking Barcelona 2024: The MSM grades
| Run | driver | Menath | Niedermaier | Stonecracker |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Verstappen | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| 2 | Norris | 1 | 2 | 1 |
| 3 | Hamilton | 2 | 2 | 2 |
| 4 | Russell | 2 | 2 | 2 |
| 5 | Leclerc | 3 | 3 | 2 |
| 6 | Sainz | 3 | 3 | 3 |
| 7 | Piastri | 4 | 5 | 5 |
| 8th | Perez | 5 | 5 | 5 |
| 9 | Gasly | 1 | 2 | 1 |
| 10 | Ocon | 3 | 3 | 3 |
| 11 | Hulkenberg | 2 | 2 | 2 |
| 12 | Alonso | 2 | 2 | 3 |
| 13 | Zhou | 3 | 4 | 3 |
| 14 | Stroll | 4 | 4 | 4 |
| 15 | Ricciardo | 3 | 3 | 3 |
| 16 | Bottas | 3 | 3 | 3 |
| 17 | Magnussen | 4 | 4 | 4 |
| 18 | Albon | 3 | 4 | 3 |
| 19 | Tsunoda | 4 | 3 | 4 |
| 20 | Sargeant | 4 | 5 | 5 |
| … | … | … | … | … |
| Run | 2 | 3 | 3 |
F1 driver ranking Barcelona 2024: Hard cases of the editorial team
Christian Menath
Positive hardship case: Max Verstappen
Negative hardship case: Sergio Perez
Traditionally, there are no particularly big outliers on a track that all drivers know so well. So Oscar Piastri’s problems were a bit of a surprise to me. It’s a shame that this is no longer the case with Sergio Perez. Red Bull is trying to encourage the Mexican and is talking about the best possible race result after another poor qualifying and penalty. That may even be correct given the tight field at the top, but it doesn’t make it any better. Red Bull and Perez have to come up with something. Even if Verstappen’s victories are poison for the excitement of the World Championship, I’m happy for him. After victories like that, even critics have to admit that he is simply the best at the moment.
Florian Niedermair
Positive hardship case: Pierre Gasly
Negative hardship case: Oscar Piastri
The tide has turned at Alpine. Ever since the team-internal clash in Monaco, Pierre Gasly set the tone after playing second fiddle at the start of the season. In Spain, Gasly was once again the faster of the two Alpine drivers. He delivered a flawless Grand Prix without any major highlights. It was almost enough for P8, but Sergio Perez was too fast in the end. Perez would also have been a good candidate for the negative hardship case, but for him such abysmal performance is now standard. Not so for Oscar Piastri. For the Australian, who often shows weaknesses in tire management, Barcelona was the ultimate litmus test. He did not pass it. On top of that, there was a botched qualifying. Only P7 in the fastest car in the field? The supposed super talent cannot afford to do that too often.
Markus Steinrisser
Positive hardship case: Lewis Hamilton
Negative hardship case: Logan Sargeant
He can do it, and there is no sabotage. Can we all calm down, right? I have to I have to agree with Toto Wolff. This idea that Lewis Hamilton is being actively held back by the team is completely absurd. A strong qualifying on top of that, and we should all keep in mind what caliber of driver we are dealing with here. In retrospect, I don’t really know what to make of Logan Sargeant. For the first time, he had the same parts as Alex Albon, and promptly complained that they obviously didn’t work as well for him. It wasn’t the optimal strategy either. In the end, he is 0.356 seconds behind Alex Albon in qualifying and 26 seconds behind in the race. A long way to go. And now what?
The top 5 in the MSM season ranking 2024 to Spain
In the real World Championship, Lando Norris has just taken over second place. In the annual rankings, he is just beginning to pull away from the rest of the field towards Verstappen. At the moment, it doesn’t look like there is another driver who can come close to these two in terms of consistency. Lewis Hamilton jumps up to 16th place with big points. Just two more points and he’ll have Ollie Bearman!
How the MSM driver ranking works
Long-time MSM readers already know the ranking, the now proven system of previous years will enter its sixth year in 2024. Immediately after the finish of each Grand Prix, we will call you in our Formula 1 live ticker for the race and here in the article about the ratings of all 20 drivers. You can rate as much as you like until next midday (or longer for evening overseas races).
The average of your marks is used to give each driver a reader’s mark. In parallel with you, we, the MSM F1 crew around Christian Menath, Florian Niedermair and Markus Steinrisser, also rate the performance of all drivers on the weekend in question. We also calculate an average from our judgements – the MSM mark. The overall mark is created in the last step by averaging the user and MSM marks in equal parts. In the event of a tie in the final ranking, the best individual mark decides.
As a little extra, each editor provides his personal hardships of the weekend by choosing and explaining which driver particularly caught his attention. Once in a positive and once in a negative sense. Online, the overall result is always 18:00 the day after the race.