Lance Stroll, Aston Martin, Yas Marina, 2021

2021 F1 driver rankings #16: Lance Stroll

2021 F1 driver rankings

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Aside from his second year in Formula 1, when he was paired with a rookie, Lance Stroll has never been his team’s leading points-scorer.

Lance Stroll

Beat team mate in qualifying8/21
Beat team mate in race10/17
Races finished19/22
Laps spent ahead of team mate623/1144
Qualifying margin+0.21s
Points34

But he has usually been a dependable finisher who would occasionally grab an eye-catching result. Like the podium finish in his eighth F1 start or pole position at Istanbul last year: Something to vindicate his doubters and vex the vocal critics who question whether he would be in F1 at all if his father didn’t own his team.

But despite being in the same (albeit rebranded) team for the third year in a row, Stroll’s 2021 form didn’t run to the usual pattern. Yes, he picked up nine points finishes, but all of the team’s noteworthy results were taken by Sebastian Vettel.

Wasn’t that to be expected, given Vettel’s experience and exceptional track record? Perhaps, but keep in mind Vettel was comprehensively beaten in 2020 by a driver with 20 fewer starts to his name than Stroll.

Within a few races of joining Aston Martin, Stroll’s new team mate had the measure of him. Vettel qualified and finished ahead of Stroll in Portugal despite not having the team’s latest aerodynamic parts.

In the races which followed Vettel grabbed opportunities for top-five finishes while Stroll never looked like making it that far. Of course Vettel’s second on-the-road in Hungary (before his disqualification due to a technical infringement) came about thanks to a colossal error by Stroll at the start which wiped out Charles Leclerc and Daniel Ricciardo.

Lance Stroll, Aston Martin, Monaco
Eighth in Monaco was typical of Stroll’s better days
To be fair to Stroll, such errors were rare, though he did crash his car in qualifying at Baku as well. The next day he crashed again, this time blamelessly due to a tyre failure, while Vettel coincidentally also came home second.

At times it felt as if Stroll had become a bit too eager to keep his team mate behind when the chance arose. He dealt with Vettel very firmly on the first lap at Monza – a bit too firmly for a driver in the same car – on his way to seventh place, which was his best finish of the year at that point. They tangled again in Sochi when Stroll floundered as rain began to fall (he also knocked Gasly into a spin).

As in previous seasons the key weakness in Stroll’s game was qualifying. He failed to progress beyond Q1 seven times, more than twice as often as his team mate, often leaving himself with more to do in the races.

He made up for some of that with his starts (another pattern from previous campaigns) though not to the same spectacular effect as Kimi Raikkonen. The upshot was Stroll seldom made it higher up the order than eighth by the chequered flag.

His race pace was better and he wielded it well at times. These occasions included Monaco (where he rose from 12th to eighth, albeit three places behind Vettel), France (collecting a point after dropping out in Q1 thanks to a track limits violation), Britain (eighth after a pair of good starts) and Turkey (ninth).

Stroll’s best performance of the season came in Qatar, where he made one of his better starts, capitalised on an error by Vettel and took sixth place as others suffered tyre problems, in what must have felt like karmic re-alignment for Baku. That was his last score in a season which was generally middling with a couple of lows and no real highs to rank alongside those which made his previous campaigns memorable.

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What’s your verdict on Lance Stroll’s 2021 season? Which drivers do you feel he performed better or worse than? Have your say in the comments. Add your views on the other drivers in the comments.

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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68 comments on “2021 F1 driver rankings #16: Lance Stroll”

  1. Lance wasn’t great for sure, but he was definitely better than Gio and Kimi

    1. @jesperfey13

      I honestly feel the Alfa was only quicker than the Haas this year, so it’s hard to judge Kimi and Gio based on that car. If they were paired up against Lance, I still think Gio would have had more pace than Lance, especially in quali. And Kimi would have outraced him on Sundays as well.

    2. Kimi has always been a fan favourite – and a Racefans editorial favourite – so it will be interesting to see what factor his ranking has been multiplied by to get the final result.

      This has been an unremarkable season from Stroll, but my opinion is that this coincides with an increase in maturity. The peaks have become less obvious because he is operating at a generally higher level.

      It’s hard to judge where Vettel’s performance is these days, but Stroll has been very close to him over the season. I think he deserves a bit more credit.

      He’s certainly in the bottom third of drivers but I would rate him above Ricciardo and the Sauber pair.

    3. Again, an « easy choice » to rate lowly Stroll…. He is not popular, so worries.

      His season was not spectacular and he owns his seat to his father. But you could take the other view and say that overall he was not far away from Vettel, a 4 time world champ…

      At the end of the day, i don’t see why Ric and Perez are above him while having being completely destroyed by their teammate (of course they has a particularly bad season, but still). Not too sure about the alfa driver, but Kimi’s season was underpar and I would have rated him lower than Stroll as well

      1. Perez and Ricciardo will rank higher because of the “car bias”. Since they drive much better cars, their best performances (like a win) stand out.
        In other words, we tend to consider a win for Perez much more worthy than a 6th place for Stroll. But is this really the case?

        1. Perez and Ric were in new teams, new cars and new power units to adapt and learn.
          Stroll lost to his team mate who is new in the team.

  2. Stroll. I guess one can say Vettel showed how he really isn’t anything special when not having the advantage of more training, better setup, simulation time etc. Sadly unsurprising, and it confirms that he would almost certainly not be on the grid anymore without his father paying.

    On the other hand, who knows whether the AM/RP/Force India team would still be on the grid without the Strolls, so I guess we have to take what we get?

    I agree with the notion that Stroll, like Vettel in the last year against Leclerc, seemed too stressed out at being beaten to concentrate on himself performing well at times and that caused several mistakes. Vettel himself also did a bit of that even this year though, I guess he might still feel the pressure of having to prove he was a worthy champion after the beating he took from Charles.

    1. Jose Lopes da Silva
      7th January 2022, 11:22

      “who knows whether the AM/RP/Force India team would still be on the grid without the Strolls, so I guess we have to take what we get?”

      That means that Formula 1 is not exactly a sport.
      More precisely: that the balance between money/business and sport, always necessary in a professional and quite expensive sport like this now, is balancing again to the money, making it more money dependant and less ‘professional’ dependant, as it was in the Fifties, where it was regular to have cases of drivers buying their private cars and go race.
      If we are evaluating the sporting side, we can’t take that into consideration. We can’t say Stroll is a good driver because is father assures 2 extra cars on the grid.
      Actually, it’s the opposite. Maybe we should compare Stroll and Ocon including the amount of money that was invested in each other’s careers.
      Don’t forget to include buying F3 teams and ordering team mates to lift foot for Lance, is George Russell once complained and reporters observed.

      1. @Jose Lopes da Silva

        Money has always been a factor in sport and F1 is far from being the least professional in that sense. In professional cycling, young cyclists were typically disallowed from going for the win and selling wins was common. This has become less common and buying wins is no longer legal, although Vinokourov still obviously bought a win in 2010.

        1. Jose Lopes da Silva
          7th January 2022, 16:25

          That Vinokourov story (as I’m learning about it online) is pretty serious….
          I’m happy that is still not quite feasible in F1. Let’s hope the measures mentioned by BasCB do work.
          Yet, we’re not free from the distopian scenario put by a little known Brazilian blogger a couple of years ago: that millionaires could start to invest millions in their children’s careers and give them the ‘10000 hours of practice’ and everything else needed to become a perfect winning machine, reaching Fangio-Clark-Prost-Senna-Schumacher-Hamilton-Verstappen level with no obstacles other than go for repeated practice, perfect training, permanent coaching, etc. We would get Carlos Slim IV vs Warren Buffet IV fighting for the championship.

          And I can just pray that Lance Stroll doesn’t get a Brawn in his hands.

          (I put Max at the same level of 6 gods of the sport, let’s see if the comment numbers skyrocket)

          1. If your list is indicating anything, it’s that we don’t care how people get to F1 if they are successful.

            We only care about the ones who fail.

      2. Actually, it’s the opposite. Maybe we should compare Stroll and Ocon including the amount of money that was invested in each other’s careers.
        Don’t forget to include buying F3 teams and ordering team mates to lift foot for Lance, is George Russell once complained and reporters observed.

        Why do people want to make these rankings more difficult?

        It should be solely based on the on-track performance of the past season excluding the impact of the car.
        – rookie or nestor should not be a factor;
        – previous career and achievements should not be a factor.
        – rich or poor should not be a factor;
        – likability should not be a factor.

        1. Well said there jff. These things matter when we judge who a driver is, what potential we see in them, etc. But when comparing how they performed, we should try to take all of those things out of the equation (probably hardest with the car as such)

      3. Well, to an extent you are right to point to the unfair advantage simply spending more money brings in Motorsport, and in F1 especially Jose Lopes da Silva.

        But then, we have to be happy that F1 is currently moving towards restricting how easily money can buy one success. The limit on aero development that gives backmarkers more CFD/windtunnel allowance and limits it for the front running teams is one step (making it harder to keep winning year on year) and the budget cap is clearly meant to further limit this.

        But in between, yes, F1 is very expensive, and bringing extra money gets you a seat at the table and can buy you success

  3. Still no Alfa Romeo…
    They finished 9th in the constructor championship with the 8th fastest package.

    1. RocketTankski
      7th January 2022, 9:13

      Well Kimi has to be at least in the top 10. Because Kimi.
      Gio is a great guy who nearly delivered, so will probably be about 12th.
      Plus everyone loves the plucky Sauber team, they have a warm fuzzy nostalgia.

    2. In some races they were the 9th fastest team.

    3. @banana88x
      Ranking cars is always a bit problematic, because we can’t know how other drivers would’ve handled the car. Besides, Williams got extremely lucky in the Belgian GP.

    4. Jose Lopes da Silva
      7th January 2022, 11:24

      Why do you say they had the 8th best package? Is it because Russell in a incredible guy being able to be ahead of them?

  4. The problem with Stroll is that as long as he only continues to put in average performances he’ll keep his seat for as long as he wants. And only that seat because he’s simply not good enough for another team to want him.

    That’s had a knock on effect to Aston – imagine how much stronger they would have been with Vettel AND Perez and all their experience combined.

  5. Lance Stroll, hailed by Claire Williams as the next Max Verstappen when he debuted way too soon in F1, has a progression curve that’s next to non-existent and it shows every year in his stats. He has only beaten a teammate once in his five years of F1, and that was Sirotkin of all people. He couldn’t beat Massa, Perez walked all over him, and Vettel doesn’t seem to have much competition from the guy.

    Mind you, those latter two were absolutely stepped on by other new generation talents when they were/are teammates. So what does that ultimately tell you about Stroll, who is being advertised by his team as one that can easily stand next to them as the future of F1? Everyone knows why he has and will continue to have that seat, and luckily he’s a capable lower midfield driver so it’s not the end of the world, but just like Giovinazzi got only a few seasons before he was replaced, under normal circumstances I don’t see how Lance Stroll would have gotten more than 2 or 3 seasons of F1 if he not had his father’s money behind him. I certainly don’t see Stroll fighting for a championship like Verstappen fought Hamilton this season, so then the question becomes: what’s Aston’s ambition here?

    1. The next Verstappen…. seems Claire didn’t had any idea about drivers. She could check the Races in Florida where Lance raced with Max and Will Buxton (?) but Lance was lacking racecraft…

      While he is not bad and can have some good moments when it’s wet he is just a average driver compared with the young guns (Charles, Sainze, Lando George Albon and Max)

      1. Albon is in the same league or level as Stroll. I don’t know how anyone can think otherwise. I’d say Albon has the slightest of edge because he hasn’t been beaten by 3 teammates in 5 years. And the other one(a rookie) outqualified Stroll in 2018. But Albon hasn’t done much to include him alongside the likes of Lando, , Max, Charles and Carlos. Or even Ocon and Gasly(or Russell).

        1. Time is going to have to tell on Albon, I don’t think it’s fair to judge him based on his time in F1 so far. After all, he’s only done two race seasons, and one and a half of those was next to Max Verstappen of all people.

          Could go either way for him, to be honest, he’s definitely talented, far as I can tell, his karting record is very impressive, even if his open wheel career didn’t see him win any championships, that counts for something.

          1. Yes but Stroll won a F3 Euro title(with Russell in it) before moving to F1 in 2016. So putting Stroll and Albon at the same level is the right thing. Albon needs to win a race or do a Gasly and have a season like 2021 to get out of Stroll’s level. His new teammate isn’t the greatest of benchmarks.

    2. Jose Lopes da Silva
      7th January 2022, 11:33

      Aston ambitions it that we have to face the truth. Remember the Super Monaco formula 1 game https://www.racefans.net/2009/08/20/classic-f1-games-super-monaco-gp/ ? Each team had only a single car.
      That’s the truth. Every team wants to win the Drivers Championship, so they can rely on a single driver. That’s why Ferrari went for Schumacher and then for Alonso, that’s why Mercedes went for Bottas over 5 loong seasons. Because an intra-team battle it’s a nuisance, specially when battling for the Championship – and it’s an historical exception.
      If Super Monaco was today, You would challenge S. Fatell to get the green Jackson Racing team. The other guy would be invisible/non-existent.

      1. Just for my clarity, is that one guy supposed to be Vettel or Stroll?

        1. Jose Lopes da Silva
          7th January 2022, 16:16

          In Super Monaco, the names of the drivers and teams loosely resembled the real life 1989 ones. It was more visible in the teams, although Picos and Ceara went well for Piquet and Senna. So Fatell would be Vettel.

  6. This feels pretty harsh on Stroll. Yes, it was an unspectacular season for him, but he was still better than both Alfas and Danny Ric for sure.
    He outpaced Seb Vettel at the start of the season, while Seb was still getting comfortable with the car, and had some decent drives also in the second half of the season.
    I’d put him at least in P14, or even higher depending on where Bottas would finish in this ranking.

    1. Absolutely, thought it already when I saw schumacher’s ranking, seems having a good car over-rewards you in this ranking, ricciardo had a terrible season, stroll decent, yet he’s behind, schumacher also decent.

  7. Fair ranking I would say. One important thing to factor in with Lance is that the guy has zero pressure to justify his place in any team he races for, yet he is decisively mediocre.

    1. Sainz and Perez 0 Poles.
      Stroll 1😃
      A mediocre driver wouldn’t get 3 podiums in F1 either. This year Stroll didn’t do bad against Vettel. It’s just he couldn’t get on the podium. But he has improved a lot in 2020 and 2021 compared to his first 3 seasons which weren’t good enough for F1.

      1. Jose Lopes da Silva
        7th January 2022, 11:36

        A mediocre driver can even win a Grand Prix, was we discovered in 2012.
        You can’t take the results from those who got them, but the fact is that this is still a mechanical sport. If you race around for 100 races, there are some odds of you getting 2 or 3 podiums.
        That’s not enough for other teams to hire you based on results. It’s not enough to avoid the ‘mediocre’ label. If you win 1 race and commit blunders after blunders in 50 races, you are a mediocre driver.

        1. Okay first Maldonado in his first 2 years weren’t a mediocre driver. Crash-prone yes. But he was rapid. Won the GP 2 title in 2010 beating Perez. Then was much closer to Barrichello in 2011 than Hulkenberg was in 2010. Then absolutely crushed his teammate in qualifying in 2012, 18-2. Okay maybe Bruno Senna wasn’t a great teammate you can say. But in 2011 Senna outqualified Petrov 5-3 and Petrov outqualified Nick Heidfeld 7-3. And both Heidfeld and Petrov got podiums in 2011. And if you think Heidfeld is a mediocre driver then Perez is a even more mediocre driver. Then Maldonado turned mediocre in the last 3 years in F1 and his reputation died. But no one can deny he wasn’t rapid at the start in F1. No one wins a F1 race by accident let alone winning one holding Fernando Alonso on a Ferrari to get it.

          Okay Stroll is an interesting one. He is the definition of mediocre in his first 3 years. But last year he had some impressive performances(like getting a Pole and 2 podiums). And this year he did a decent enough job against Vettel. People don’t see it because the Aston Martin is much closer to the Williams+Alfa Romeo than the Alpine+Alpha Tauri. He beat Vettel in more races over a race distance than Vettel beat him. And wasn’t that far off in qualifying.

          1. Jose Lopes da Silva
            7th January 2022, 17:06

            Everyone in Formula 1 is rapid or quick or has the speed. We’re talking about 20 drivers. Surely there has to be 100 or 150 drivers in the world able to be quick on an F1 in their day. From that standpoint, all of them are good.
            Maybe the word “mediocre” is too heavy to apply to Formula One drivers, in the sense that they are able to tame superfast cars. Hell, Nikita Mazepin is an amazing driver compared to myself, and I have won a couple of 30-minute kart rental 20 karts-grid races. Let’s not use the word “mediocre”, ok, @knightameer?
            Hulkenberg was also fast. Really fast. Remember that pole position?!
            Having one a Grand Prix doesn’t mean you have quite the level to be in F1, at least for long and if your results drop – and especially in this day and age. In the Eighties, if Maldonado was there, was Italian and quickly available, he might get away for many years. With a little luck, he might have won the Belgian 1991 Grand Prix.
            Not today. And I don’t think Stroll is quicker or overall better than Maldonado – what he is is more safe and consistent, hence way less costly.

        2. If you race around for 100 races, there are some odds of you getting 2 or 3 podiums.

          Tell that to Hulkenberg.

          Stroll isn’t anything special, but when he does bad or average people say he has no talent. Then when he does well people say it’s the car or luck.

          You don’t get F1 podiums without talent, you certainly don’t beat Hamilton to a wet pole position without talent. Keith hates Stroll and consistently ranks him down low, but he deserves to be on the grid.

          1. While I agree stroll isn’t that bad, remember the event he got pole the mercedes wasn’t on it at least in q3, think hamilton ended up on the 3rd row, the challenge was beating the red bulls and his team mate.

          2. Jose Lopes da Silva
            7th January 2022, 17:10

            I tell that to Hulkenberg. I strictly mentioned “odds”. It might happen, it might not.
            You can get F1 podiums without the talent or commitment of professionalism to sustain a successful career – or even a long one. Remember Michael Andretti? Everyone can be quick and efficient and benefit from circumstances on a single day. A F1 driver has to do it ALWAYS. Giovinazzi is also a quick guy. But a season has 20+ races, you can’t be quick just in 5 or 6 of them.
            Unless you bought your car, of course.

          3. Everything is relative. So relative to F1 drivers some people who get there are way off the pace. Everyone can’t be quick and efficient.

        3. No, Everyone who gets to Formula 1 isn’t quick at all. Maldonado was a very quick driver. He won GP2 beating Perez and was much closer to Barrichello in 2011 than Hulkenberg was in 2010. His pace didn’t stay there though. After 2012(many mistakes but still beat his teammate 0.4 in qualifying and 18-2). His career went downhill. He got utterly dominated by Grosjean 28-6 in qualifying. Very quick at first but lost his speed after that. Mazepin is doing terrible. I don’t know how you can compare him to Maldonado. But Grosjean at Lotus was a great driver. And was operating close to his peak in 2015. So it’s not like Maldonado lost to a driver who is supposed to be worse than him. And I agree Stroll is far more consistent than Pastor ever was. But Pastor’s 2012 win was hardly a lucky win.

          1. José Lopes da Silva
            9th January 2022, 10:03

            “No, Everyone who gets to Formula 1 isn’t quick at all.”
            We are not talking of the same concept, so thia debate ends here.

      2. If you consider how much more it should have been, those podiums suddenly don’t look so great. Baku 17 could have easily won by Massa if not for a techical failure, Stroll has managed to lose even 2nd on the final meters in the same car. He could have won Italy 20 easily, he messed it up. He fluked a pole in Turkey 20, was nowhere come race day. The podium places he let slip tells more about his talent than the podium places that fell his way.

  8. I wonder how long he’ll be in F1 for? He could in theory be around for as long as he wants. *In theory, things change

    Most drivers F1 careers come to an end because nobody will have them. Obviously there are exceptions and people do leave because they want to. But we could see a 36yr old Lance in F1, and since he started young, and with more and more GP’s every year, he’s arguably the most likely to become a F1’s next ‘most experienced driver’.

    1. He could also leave himself once he notices he’s not strong enough to win a title.

    2. I mean, some drivers continue for money, but for someone like stroll that can’t be enticing.

    3. @bernasaurus I think the time Lance will be in F1 depends on what Papa Stroll’s priorities really are. If the priority is winning a constructor’s championship for Aston, then I suspect we will see Lance shipped off because he just doesn’t have the talent needed to support that level of campaign. That’s not to say he isn’t a good driver. I think he has shown he is worthy of a drive in F1, regardless of his money, but he doesn’t have the talent needed for a team at the sharp end of the grid.

      But if Stroll Sr’s priorities are providing the best opportunities for his son, then we could see him in the team for quite a while. I think though that we would see a decline in the talent attracted to the team if that is what the true priority is. I don’t think you would get a top-tier driver to drive alongside him and I don’t think you would get the best engineers and aerodynamicists working in the team if they knew it was just a vanity project for Lance and they couldn’t really depend on him to consistently fight for podiums. So I think the team would slowly move towards the tail end of the grid as the talent they have attracted to date move on to better opportunities and/or people at the ends of their careers who are looking for a fat payday decide to cash in.

      1. Jose Lopes da Silva
        7th January 2022, 17:15

        Basically you nailed all the aspects.
        Eventually Mr. Lawrence Stroll is now in the business of running a Grand Prix team, so I go for the first hypotesis. The team can perfectly reach for the top the way Benetton-Ford accomplished in 1994. The number 2 driver of Aston Martin will be in a better place than Jos V. or JJ Lehto. (Who knows if he will succeed, of course.)

      2. The past 5 years have shown us that you don’t need any special talent in the second car to win WCCs.

        Lance is at the least good enough to fill that role so there’s unlikely going to be pressure to replace him ‘for the good of the team.’

  9. Predictably mediocre, but I personally believe it’s hard to grade him against his teammate or the rest of the field as the car spent a good portion of the year fairly off the pace…

    When Stroll was failing to get out of Q1, don’t forget Vettel was often only just squeaking through at the same time.

  10. Beat Vettel 10 out of a possible 17 times over a race distance. Interesting…

  11. I feel Stroll has gone from over-hated to over-rated, particularly by the younger fans. He didn’t deserve the barrage of criticism in 2017 – he’s not the first pay driver by any measure – but hasn’t really done enough since to justify his seat since. After 5 years in the sport, he’s only beaten Sirotkin, and lost to Massa (albeit rookie year, and it was close), Perez and now Vettel. One would wonder if Lawrence buying and upgrading an entire Formula 1 team is worth it for them. Running a hypercar team in Le Mans 2023 would almost certainly be cheaper!

    1. You are completely missing the point. Look at the gap between him and teammates not just points. Massa was beating him by almost 1 second in qualifying and 17-2 overall. Perez beat him 18-3 in qualifying albeit the gap was now closer only 0.2-0.3 tenths. But Stroll is now a much better driver in the last 2 years. He beat Vettel 11 times over a race distance this year and only 8-12 in qualifying with a gap of around 0.13. He is definitely good enough for F1 at the moment. And still have time to develop.

  12. I actually think Stroll is better than Albon. Yes, he has been in Formula 1 for longer but he has more big moments than Alex Albon.

  13. I am a bit (little bit) of a Vettel supporter. Coming into this season, I had expected Vettel to thoroughly wipe the floor with Stroll. Not just be better, but really, really, wipe the floor.

    He didn’t really, did he? So now I am left uncertain whether Vettel had an off-season, is past his prime (no shame there!), is less of a driver than I would like to think, or, just maybe, Stroll isn’t quite as bad as all that.

    I cannot completely rule out the latter.

  14. I feel like the suggestion that Stroll wouldnt be in F1 if his father wasnt paying for it (or owner of the team) is erroneous given his junior record.

    In fact Stroll probably would be a better driver without quite so much of his fathers money. He wouldnt have been promoted far too early to a Williams team that wasnt capable of nurturing him and his talent. Instead he would have gone on and done GP3, GP2/F2 and learned his craft a bit more.

    When you look at a driver like Mazepin for example, who comes from a very similar background and backing. The difference is obvious in the two’s talent level. Mazepin despite all his father’s money still managed to spend 10 years in junior formulae being unsuccesful before his father all-but-bought a team for him to drive for. Stroll however took his father’s money and succeeded, winning championships and earning an albeit far too early call from Williams.

    I’m not saying that in the same team Stroll would suddenly start beating Lewis or Max, but he definitely deserves better than to be thrown into the huge no talent pay-driver maelstrom that Mazepin and Zhou are part of.

    1. What makes you think Latifi isn’t part of no talent pay-driver maelstrom?

      1. Well, he’s been improving compared to russell, and this year we’ll see if russell is really a top driver.

    2. I fully believe based on his junior records, he would have made it to F1 (of course ignoring that he was bought into the best seats and allegedly the control that was had over the choice and role of teammates) easily. Not at 18 though, that’s for sure.

      But as I said above, he would never have had five seasons in F1 with his performances. He’s no better than a Giovinazzi, a Palmer, Gutiérrez, or the like. All worthy of a shot at F1 at some point, none of them worthy of long 6 or more seasons of running.

      1. Mate you are going to ridiculous levels of insanity. First Stroll is still young. 24 next year. Palmer showed nothing in F1. And his last year was one of the worst performances by a driver in recent F1 history. Gutierrez showed nothing in F1 either. And was terrible in races in 2016. Giovinazzi may have had talent but unfortunately wasn’t even in a half-decent car after his rookie year. To rank those guys among Stroll is ridiculous. If you say Stroll is no better than Kvyat or Albon. That’s pretty reasonable.

  15. I never really know what to think of Stroll. I still think he gets too much hate just because of who his father is. I know people will often talk about his failure to beat team mates, but let’s be honest, he has had some very good team mates in his time, so is that really unexpected? At the same time, there’s obviously things that have happened that have kept him in F1 which wouldn’t have happened if his father wasn’t bringing the cash (obviously if he had no money then Perez wouldn’t have been let go instead of Stroll last year for example).

    1. Or ocon the other year.

  16. People react too quickly. Ocon and Perez both won races this year. And is in better cars than Stroll. So everything worked out all right.

    1. Jose Lopes da Silva
      7th January 2022, 17:17

      5 seasons is not “too quickly”…

  17. This is the first ranking I disagree with. I think, despite two awful weekends in Hungary and Mexico, Stroll was generally did okay this year. He wasn’t far behind Vettel, and had some strong weekends such as Qatar, Styria and Imola. It may be that you think the Aston Martin was actually a much quicker car than it seemed in the hands of these two, which is fair and if so I would expect Vettel’s name to come up very soon. But I reckon it was definitely the seventh-best car and Vettel and Stroll both neither over-performed or under-performed relative to the car. I would definitely rate him above both Alfa Romeo drivers and Daniel Ricciardo, all of whom definitely under-performed relative to the pace of the car.

  18. I wonder why the greatest fail of 2021 (car no. 3) hasn’t yet featured in the ranking …

  19. How did he get ranked ahead of Schumacher???

  20. Stroll really disappointing this year. Let’s see if this year Aston Martin is competitive. Stroll always shine better on faster car anyway.

    1. Nope this is the only season he looked good against his teammate. It didn’t had flashier performances unfortunately but he was actually consistently decent. Which can’t be said of his previous 4 year performances.

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