2016 F1 season driver rankings #22: Kvyat

2016 F1 season review

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Daniil Kvyat

Beat team mate in qualifying6/20
Beat team mate in race3/15
Races finished15/21
Laps spent ahead of team mate212/924
Points25

Daniil Kvyat’s demotion four races into the season was an unprecedented situation for him to cope with. Losing an F1 seat usually means exiting the sport entirely, not being shunted into your team’s junior squad where the pressures remain but the rewards are far smaller.

It had been a tough start to the season for Kvyat. He was eliminated in Q1 in Australia (then failing to start the race due to an electrical failure) and only made it to Q2 in Bahrain. A somewhat fortuitous podium in China looked like a confidence boost but then came Russia.

First Kvyat ran into the back of Vettel, sparking a chain reaction which hobbled two of Red Bull’s other cars. Then he finished off the Ferrari at the next corner, dumping Vettel into the barriers. Soon afterwards his name was being stitched onto Toro Rosso overalls.

A point in Spain raised hopes he might have landed on his feet. But Carlos Sainz Jnr proved almost as tough competition as Daniel Ricciardo, and Kvyat was at an added disadvantage of not having as much experience with the car.

It was hardly a surprise, then, that Sainz hammered him. Kvayt’s total of 25 points looks reasonable until you realise all bar four of them came with Toro Rosso. Sainz out-scored him by more than ten to one.

The slog to the summer break was long and hard. In Monaco a technical failure put him a lap down and then he crashed into Kevin Magnussen. Just when he seemed to be making progress, such as his sixth-placed qualifying performance in Baku, the car let him down. In Germany he dropped out in Q1 and looked dejected.

The last race before the break went better and on his return Kvyat showed some improvement. This wasn’t always obvious as by this point Toro Rosso had been out-developed by their closest rivals. Kvyat at least managed to hold his head up against Sainz in qualifying more often, and he had a good run to ninth in Singapore, but the overall record between them was one of the most one-sided.

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Over to you

He somehow makes it possible to rear-end another car three times in a single season. I’m seriously surprised they’ve kept him on at Toro Rosso.
Riock (@Addvariety)

What’s your verdict on Daniil Kvyat’s 2016 season? Which drivers do you feel he performed better or worse than? Have your say in the comments.

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View race-by-race notes on Daniil Kvyat

Australia – Having scored points on his 2014 debut at Melbourne Kvyat has failed to even start on his next two visits to the track. This time an electrical problem halted him as he arrived at the grid.

Bahrain – Dejected after another disappointing run in qualifying – although he went out in Q2 instead of Q1 he still lined up ten places behind his team mate. “We were pretty much nowhere,” he admitted. The race went much better: he made up three places at the start and ran a long opening stint to give him the benefit of fresher tyres while others were on more worn rubber. This helped him pass rivals despite the Red Bull’s lack of straight-line speed, and an opportunistic move on Massa netted a damage-limiting seventh.

China – While his team mate hit new heights on Saturday, Kvyat quietly enjoy by far his most convincing qualifying performance of the year. He made a quick start and surprised the Ferraris with a pass which was legitimate despite Vettel’s over-strenuous protestations. Had it been the other car running second at the restart Ricciardo might have had the pace to keep Vettel behind, but having to run the medium tyres at the final stint made life tricky for Kvyat.

Russia – On good form at his home track, he ended Friday only a tenth of a second off Ricciardo. Qualifying was a close run thing – he only just made it out of Q2. He didn’t have time to do a warm-up lap in Q3, so ending up three-tenths off Ricciardo was reasonable. The race was a disaster, however – two major errors within seconds of the start ruined several drivers’ races, including Red Bull stablemates Ricciardo and Sainz.

Spain – Like Verstappen, Kvyat had to acclimatise quickly to a new car. He used an extra set of soft tyres early in qualifying which led to an unsuccessful bid to accompany Sainz into Q3. He had to surrender places to Hulkenberg and Palmer early on as the stewards ruled he’d taken them under the Safety Car. A late switch to soft tyres allowed him to keep pace with the leaders and pass Gutierrez for the final points place with four laps to go.

Monaco – Was disappointed with his Q3 run which was almost half a second off his time from Q2 and a similar margin down on his team mate’s effort. An electrical problem dropped him off the lead lap but he got too ambitious trying to un-lap himself from Magnussen, earning himself a grid penalty for the next race.

Canada – Ran ahead of his team mate at the start of the race and used a similar strategy but never managed to get out of traffic. Described his race as “boring” after spending much of it stuck behind other cars.

Europe – Was able to hold his head up again after a trouble-free run in qualifying earned him a solid sixth on the grid. Unfortunately a suspension failure kept him from delivering on the car’s potential.

Austria – Got a bit greedy with the kerb at turn eight in qualifying and paid a heavy penalty as his suspension gave way, spinning him out. His race never even got going – he was out soon after the start with an as-yet unspecified mechanical problem.

Britain – Lost time behind Magnussen in Q2 and failed to accompany his team mate into the top ten shoot-out. However he salvaged a point from the race despite going off at The Loop after switching to intermediates.

Hungary – Although Toro Rosso managed to get Kvyat a late run in Q2 when the track was at its driest, he complained about losing time behind Button and said his crew did not have his tyres ready soon enough. He missed the cut – lapping over four seconds slower than Sainz – which meant he started six places behind his team mate. He was in the wrong settings at the start of the race and fell to 20th place, which made for a long day in the office.

Germany – Hit a low in qualifying with an error-strewn lap which was only good enough to beat the Saubers and one Manor. His race pace was better, however, and he had his team mate in sight at the chequered flag despite losing time when he made his first pit stop.

Belgium – Said there was little more in the car despite going out in Q1 – Sainz was less than two-tenths of a second faster. The race went well: he ran eighth after the restart having changed tyres during the suspension, and he even raced Perez before being caught by the quicker recovering cars. The car’s shortage of top speed meant he wasn’t able to keep Grosjean behind, though. “We can say we did our absolute best today, ” he reflected afterwards, “unfortunately not many people will see this, as we only ended up P14”.

Italy – Blamed Grosjean for failing to get into Q1 after catching the Haas driver at the end of his final flying lap, which Kvyat reckoned cost him two-tenths of a second. His race never really got going: He was passed by Alonso and Gutierrez and later retired due to his battery overheating.

Singapore – Needed and deserved his confidence-boosting seventh on the grid, right behind Sainz. Stuck behind Alonso early on he then slipped behind Perez too and had to give best to Verstappen after a superb tussle between the two.

Japan – A gearbox problem at the end of first practice which cost him some time in the second session. He was also vexed by an ‘octopus’: strands of discarded tyre rubber which caught on an antenna. On a tough weekend for Toro Rosso he narrowly out-qualified Sainz and finished ahead too, albeit only 13th.

Malaysia – Edged Sainz by a slim margin in qualifying. However he ran into Magnussen at the start and damaged his front wing, putting him out of contention for the points.

United States – After getting a vote of confidence from the team who announced his 2017 contract ahead of qualifying, Kvyat didn’t make the cut for Q3 as Sainz found three-tenths more in the car. He hit Perez on lap one and picked up a ten-second penalty, but his gap to Sainz at the flag was more than a minute.

Mexico – An electrical problem left Kvyat without power in Q1 and he couldn’t make it beyond there. In the race he made life unnecessarily difficult for himself by refusing to yield a position when he was told to, leading to a penalty.

Brazil – Was the quicker of the two Toro Rosso drivers in qualifying for once but his tidy lap didn’t trouble the top ten. He sacrificed track position with an early pit stop for intermediates, then was hit by Palmer. His team reckoned the damage to his diffuser cost Kvyat around 20 points of downforce, and he also picked up a puncture. The two Red Bulls ejected him from the points positions late in the race and in the final laps Alonso and Bottas demoted him too.

Abu Dhabi – Matters came to a head over Toro Rosso’s spate of recent punctures on Friday. Two further left-rear failures for Kvyat, culminating in a high-speed spin during the second session, led the team to park its cars while the cause was investigated. A brake duct was eventually found to be the culprit. The drivers therefore had to improvise in qualifying and Kvyat did best, though he couldn’t progress beyond Q1. Having moved up to 13th early on he retired with gearbox failure on a wasted weekend.

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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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48 comments on “2016 F1 season driver rankings #22: Kvyat”

  1. Scandalous from Red Bull to keep him for 2017 in that Toro Rosso. I think Keith is right, he was the worst driver this year. It seems like Red Bull have something against the French, first promoting Kvyat over Vergne and now keeping the Russian when the talented Gasly is available and has nowhere to race as he won GP2 this year.

    1. I always felt it wrong that Vergne was overlooked and lost out to this guy, I thought he would have been the better option for the RB seat, but instead ended up out of F1.
      Not quite sure why Kvyat has been retained for 2017.

    2. I thought Kvyat was actually better than Vergne as he showed much more promise. To be fair, their decision to promote him to Red Bull did pay off when he actually finished with more points than Ricciardo in their first season together.

      Kvyat is definitely a good driver, but 2016 was an absolute disaster for him. I’m sure they retained him for 2017 only because they had seen enough promise in 2014 and 2015. He can be an asset if he bounce back.

      1. > To be fair, their decision to promote him to Red Bull did pay off when he actually finished with more points than Ricciardo in their first season together.

        means nothing, Ricciardo lost a MASSIVE amount due to things outside his control.

    3. @francorchamps17 Kvyat was rightfully promoted over Vergne. Kvyat (the verstappen of 2013, youngest driver, coming from gp3, taken over DaCosta…) was quick and marvellous in the rain (SPA 2013) but somehow his raw speed didn’t translate in progress, Vergne was also good at times but he went nowhere in his time in STR, and since. Horner has said Kvyat didn’t transition well to brake-by-wire, but it’s also his attitude that is lacking.

  2. I didn’t quite have Kvyat so low down my rankings but it really was a shocking season for him. I hope this was a character-building year for him, because at his age we really shouldn’t be talking about him exiting from F1 altogether. I still stand by my view however that he should have raced with another team in 2017. The guy is quick, but his confidence was nonexistent at points this year.

    1. Yeah, I also rated him a bit higher amongst the field. I do think he has potential, but the promotion to the big team probably came at the wrong time for him. And demotion certainly found him searching for a purpose.

  3. Jonathan Parkin
    6th December 2016, 12:48

    I did feel sorry for Danill Kyvat to be honest. I don’t know the full sequence of events that led to Vettel’s retirement in Russia, but his demotion to Toro Rosso did seem harsh at the time to me. It was sad to see him not cope with the move downwards and wondered if it had been another driver he had collided with would the move have happened

  4. Racing is like any job well. If you don’t perform usually you get replaced.

  5. Michael (@freelittlebirds)
    6th December 2016, 13:00

    Nothing hinted at what a brutal sport F1 is as Kvyat’s demotion this year. The reason was obvious – they wanted to keep Max.

    Oddly if Red Bull were the leading team last year, Kvyat would have been the WDC as he beat Daniel over a season.

    All the folks who say that Rosberg is a deserving champion weren’t clamoring that Kvyat is a deserving Red Bull driver. But he beat Ricciardo over an entire season by a whopping 3 points under 100 (12 at 400), right? More points, done deal!

    Horner didn’t think so:-)

    1. @freelittlebirds You must be joking. Looking closely at the 2014 season, Kvyat was clearly slower than Ricciardo, besides Raikkonen and Vettel, that was the most uneven pairing in f1, and it eventually became the worse pairing in f1 because Raikkonen picked up the pace. Kvyat was good in one thing in 2014 and that was being lucky and safe, when he lost both, he got replaced, cruel but justified.

      1. Michael (@freelittlebirds)
        8th December 2016, 3:41

        Do you mean 2015? That’s when Riccardo was teamed up with Kvyat.

        According to this analysis, it was too close to call…
        https://www.racefans.net/2015/12/07/2015-statistics-team-mate-battles/

        However, in all honesty that was Kvyat’s 1st year in the Red Bull and he beat Daniel.

  6. Marko decided to keep Kvyat only to keep Gasly. Sainz will eventually fly out from Toro Rosso to Redbull in case Ricciardo had a bad season against Max in 2017 or to other team such as McLaren, Renault or even Mercedes. Sainz has demonstrated a lot of talent and Marko doesn’t want to let him go… yet. As soon as they had another top pilot coming from lower categories, they will let Sainz go or they will get rid of Kvyat.

    In other words, Sainz hunger and the possibility of letting him go is the only reason why Kvyat remains in his seat.

  7. I think there were several drivers that were worse than Kvyat this season. I just wish the decision to drop him had been made either before the season started or keep him to the end of the season. I thought it was very unfair for Red Bull to do what they did. He was the only driver at Red Bull to get a podium in the 1st 4 races and he couldn’t even take part in Australia. In Bahrain, I’d say that was just an average race. In China, while Ricciardo had bad luck and was clearly better, it was still an extremely good race that resulted in a podium. Russia was indeed a bad race but many drivers have at leased one bad race weekend. Just look what Verstappen had just after he joined Red Bull. He may have won his very first race but Monaco after that IMO was probably the most scrappy weekend any driver this season has had. I mean, a crash involving just himself in practice, qualifying and the race. I know Verstappen is much better overall than Kvyat, but I still would have preferred Red Bull to either grab him at the start of the season or wait until next season no matter how impressive he looked. I am sure Kvyat would have had a better year at Toro Rosso if he didn’t have to deal with the stress of being dropped by one of the best teams part way through the season.

    Many won’t agree with me here, but I think it was a good decision that Toro Rosso kept him. I think with a fresh start, his confidence will be back and I think he will be far closer to Sainz, possibly even match or beat him. He has shown brilliant driving at times. People have got to remember that Kvyat beat Ricciardo. I know this wouldn’t have been anywhere near as likely if it wasn’t down to Ricciardo’s bad luck. But it certainly was partly to do with him putting in plenty of very good performances. Ricciardo had several weekends where Kvyat simply looked stronger, similar to what has happened with Verstappen and Ricciardo this year. There have been times where Verstappen had looked better. It has been a bad year for Kvyat but I’m sure he’ll be a whole lot better next year. Just another thing to say is that I think Kvyat has had by far the worst reliability out of any driver this season. 6 retirements and if I remember correctly, I don’t think any of them were his own fault. That won’t have helped his confidence.

    1. Michael (@freelittlebirds)
      6th December 2016, 13:17

      +1

      It should noted that Kvyat beat Ricciardo in his rookie year.

      I’m not sure about keeping him with Sainz – Kvyat’s career will be impossible to restore unless he starts driving like Max in the rain… Toro Rosso won’t keep him even if he performs above average and he’d be lucky to driver for midfield teams.

      Ultimately he might destroy Sainz’s career unless Sainz can outscore him handily. If Kvyat does really well along with Sainz, people will just assume both are underperforming or being above average.

      This is Sainz’s 3rd season at Toro Rosso and the car was a dog at the end of the year. His performance will eventually suffer as anyone’s in that situation would – I call it the “there’s no light at the end of the tunnel” syndrome.

  8. ColdFly F1 (@)
    6th December 2016, 13:12

    25 points looks reasonable until you realise all bar four of them came with Toro Rosso

    probably should read: “25 points looks reasonable until you realise a mere four of them came with Toro Rosso”
    or:”25 points looks reasonable until you realise all bar four of them came with Red Bull
    @keithcollantine

    1. Seconded. Came to say more-or-less same thing (change Toro Rosso to Red Bull which is what I imagine Keith intended).

  9. He was beaten by Ricciardo big league in the first four grands prix this year (being replaced only because of Russia’s first lap is not true) and then it was similar in Toro Rosso. Talking about Kvyat winning in Spain is very far-reaching based on how he was performing up to this point. He is really lucky to keep his seat and sorry for Gasly that even winning a GP2 maybe be not enough.

    1. @michal2009b
      Kvyat couldn’t help that he was beaten by Ricciardo in Australia as he couldn’t even start the race. Kvyat also got 3rd in China and Ricciardo finished behind him. I know this was luck but you can’t say he was beaten in the first 4 races as he wasn’t beaten in one of them and couldn’t even take part through no fault of his own in another. He was beaten by a long way by Ricciardo in Bahrain partly because of the stupid qualifying used back then. In Q1, the team seemed to think they had done enough to get him to Q2 but that wasn’t the case. He did reasonably well to get back up to 8th. Then China was a very good race. Russia was the race that was clearly a bad one.

      1. He was nowhere near Ricciardo in qualifying, 1.1s slower in Australia, 1.2s in Bahrain, 0.5s in China, 0.3s in Russia, that’s an average of 0.8s, a huge margin. That’s not a driver deserving a second/third best car in the field.

        1. Qualifying isn’t what is the most important.

          1. no, man, but come on… Kvyat is not very fast in quali and prone to making mistakes in races. He made RAI and VET collide with each other in China by coming in too hot, he rammed twice the Ferrari of VET in Russia, he tangled with MAG in Monaco, he crashed into PER in Austin… these are just from the top of my head as i don’t remember all of them from the 2016 season.

          2. @gechichan
            That in China wasn’t his fault in the slightest. If I remember correctly, he didn’t even get investigated. Vettel just overreacted. The next race incident with Vettel was obviously his fault entirely. If I am comparing him to ricciardo, then it is certainly true that he makes far more mistakes but if you think about it, Verstappen has made quite a few mistakes this year also. He had a terrible race weekend in Monaco. Then at Spa, a slightly overly optimistic move in the 1st corner on lap 1 that resulted in him causing himself some damage. He then made a move on Kimi later on that was right on the edge and very close to a crash that later resulted in something drivers could no longer do. He obviously got away with that one. Then he’s also had a penalty for cutting the corner in Mexico. Verstappen is clearly better than Kvyat but they both have made plenty of errors this year.
            Even if it was down to luck, it won’t just have been that that made Kvyat beat Ricciardo last year. With a fresh start, I think he’ll come across pretty strong again.

          3. @gechichan
            If you look closely, that wasn’t Kvyat’s fault, he didn’t even touch Seb and also Seb left him a really big space. Seb was just overreacted.

  10. Didn’t Tost once say that Kyyat was better than any other toro rosso driver he had run?

    1. @tenerifeman, No I don’t think he did. However, Tost did mention that Kvyat performed increadibly well in some of the tests Red Bull had put him through.

      I think it’s simply the case of ultime speed in perfect conditions isn’t enough to be great in F1. A driver needs to perform at a very high level consistently, and be able to mentally manage and overcome diffucult situations.

    2. RossoTorro (@)
      6th December 2016, 13:47

      It was more a list of drivers he liked working with, not only about performance.

      The list:
      1. Kvyat
      2. Vettel
      3. Verstappen
      4. Sainz
      5. Ricciardo

  11. RossoTorro (@)
    6th December 2016, 13:52

    Rating Kvyat at #22? That is a bit harsh for someone who got this years first podium for Red Bull then was thrown of a cliff and had to make his way back up again, when not hampered by technical issues since Singapore he didn’t perform much worse than Sainz did who is lauded because strategy and safety cars lucked him in a few good results at the end of the season.

    1. Kvyat is not 22 in 2016 as you rightly point out – and he is still fast and young so to me it make perfect sense that he is in F1 in 2017. I am not a Kvyat fan but young got to be fair to him.

  12. Considering how he ended up regularly beating Sainz who you’re likely putting ij the top 6, this is again unfair

    1. If you count 2 out of 11 races (in which both finished) as regularly…

      1. @ben-n

        Certainly in qualifying though. Since Malaysia it’s 4-1 to Kvyat (excluding Mexico where Kvyat’s had a technical issue). In those races he’s probably been as good or better than Sainz but has had bad luck. In Malaysia he was caught up in a lap one incident, Brazil was where Palmer crashed into him and Abu Dhabi his car failed when he was running superbly. I expect him to be better than Sainz next season.

        1. @lolzerbob
          I can’t be sure about him being better that Sainz but I’m sure he’ll be a huge amount stronger than he’s been this year. I feel he should be very evenly matched with Sainz when he’s got a fresh start with a team he’s going to remain with without getting kicked out to a worse team part way through the season! That really lost him some confidence. I’m really happy that he’s got another chance.

        2. This is what I meant, and I think it is signifcant enought for him not to be 22nd and Sainz top 6.

  13. Kvyat in Mercedes will be great for marketing view point. Russian love Mercedes and base on his 2015 performance, Kvyat can score lots of crucial points.

    1. I would love to see that happen <3

  14. Don’t think getting demoted out of a team that went on the win two races and get multiple podiums (the first one of which was delivered by him) does wonders for anyone’s confidence. It’s obvious he’s form slumped dramatically because of it. Probably would’ve been best to release him at the end of the season.

    While I do think he’s the weakest out of the 4 drivers Red Bull currently have in F1, driver program seems to be exceptionally harsh at times. Ultimately the right call to promote Max but the way it was done was very brutal in my opinion. Seems like Toro Rosso is either your way to the top, or your career killer, there’s no in between. Still baffles me why Sainz didn’t take the Renault offer.

    1. DaveF1 (@davef1)
      6th December 2016, 14:36 Apparently Sainz has a very strong contract with Red Bull and Horner refused to let him go to Renault. Torro Rosso think very highly of Sainz.

    2. Michael (@freelittlebirds)
      6th December 2016, 15:35

      @davef1 very true about Toro Rosso being the way to the top or most likely a career killer.

      I’m really worried about it killing Sainz’s career. Nothing good comes from being in a midfield team for many years in a row unless that team is an engine manufacturer.

      You practically always end up looking bad one way or another or become forgettable. Then again, there are only 5-6 top seats so 3 out of 4 excellent drivers will probably never get a chance to drive a good car.

  15. it was a savage demotion, the next race, Redbull won the race, and so nearly again in Monaco… and with the Monaco engine upgrade they became a serious player again. a total kick in the guts for Kvyat, no wonder he performed very average afterwards… Kvyat is a talented driver – but he has shown to be an A- or B grade driver in f1… a position which is enough to win a championship in a good car, as has been shown a few times over the years, but having lost the opportunity, Kvyat is sidelined to be a midfield driver for the rest of his career now.

  16. Was there any race weekend his car didn’t have an issue, while driving for both teams?

  17. Kvyat was probably lack the mentality. His emotion was like a roller coaster and I think that affected his performance this season. We should remember his age. Unlike Verstappen, I don’t see any close group of men guiding him in his career. He looked like being alone out there…

  18. Kvyat is a GP3 champion who was funded by RB for a reason as a junior. He isn’t a bad driver. If he can get his head together he is capable of delivering a good season next year in theory. However, with what happened to this kid is not it’s easy to never fully recover. We’ll see.

  19. I think this rating of 22nd is wrong. Looking at the Spanish GP onwards, there was only one driver below him on the WDC points table who finished more races ahead of Kvyat than behind him, and that was Jenson Button, every other driver below him finished more races behind him than they were ahead of him.
    I used a point system of 1 point where Kvyat finished ahead of the other driver, 0 points if they both retired, and -1 point if the other driver finished ahead of Kvyat. The only driver ranked lower on the WDC result table to have completed more races ahead of him than behind him was Jenson Button, who got a score of -2, so he finished 2 more races ahead of Kvyat than Kvyat finished ahead of him. Every other driver below Button was beaten in race position placement by Kvyat between the Spanish GP and the end of the season. The drivers with the least amount of finished behinds were Jolyon Palmer and  Esteban Gutiérrez, who both got a score of 1, so Kvyat finished one more race ahead of each of them than he was behind them.
    As such, I believe Kvyat’s rank should at be placed ahead of Jolyon Palmer and behind Jenson Button.

    1. @drycrust interesting system, but how do you factor in team strenght in this system?

      I mean, if Hamilton and Wehrlein swapped seats, Hamilton would struggle to score points unless a bunch of better cars retire and Wehrlein would win multiple races (probably not beating ROS, but still).

      To me, however way you want to cut it, rating the drivers is always a largly subjective excersize where personal bias and overestimated/underestimated factors and narratives play a part.

      1. @jeffreyj Yes, I agree with you, rankings are highly subjective. Also, I didn’t factor in team strength, or rather I didn’t exclude it, but then I don’ t know how you could exclude team strength. I think the team has to accept a lot of responsibility in how their drivers are rated. The impression I had got from watching races is Kvyat is a better driver than his ranking of 22nd, and so my interest was to see if that was a fair assessment. I came to the conclusion that it wasn’t because from the time he joined STR he did outperformed most of the people below him on the WDC table, so while he got a boost to his ranking because of his performance in RBR, the only driver that actually outperformed him from the Spanish GP onwards was Jenson Button, none of the others did.
        I actually tweaked my spreadsheet out of curiosity to see how Kvyat compared to all the other drivers (excluding Stoffel Vandoorne, who only raced once in the season, also I regarded Rio Haryanto  and Esteban Ocon as one driver). There are 17 races from the Spanish GP through to Abu Dhabi, and only two drivers beat Kvyat in all 17 races: Danniel Ricciardo and Sergio Perez. Carlos Sainz received a score of -9, meaning he was ahead of Kvyat 9 more times than Kvyat was ahead of him. The actual breakdown is this: Kvyat Ahead = 3, Kvyat Behind = 12, Draw (i.e. both retired) = 2.
        The breakdown for Jenson Button was: Kvyat Ahead = 7, Kvyat Behind = 9, Draw = 1. Looking at those figures closer, they both had a lot of retirements. Where one driver retired and one finished the race, the one that finished is counted as ahead of the one that retired. When they both did complete the race Kvyat beat Button to the finish line 3 times, while Button finished ahead of Kvyat 5 times, the rest of the Aheads or Behinds involved a retired. If Kvyat was truely rated as 22nd on the grid then he wouldn’t have beaten Button to the finish line even those 3 times.

  20. Esploratore
    1st July 2017, 2:07

    You surely meant to say all except 4 of his points came in red bull, not toro rosso, otherwise it doesn’t make sense that almost all his points came with toro rosso and that he got outscored by sains 10 to 1, while the other way it makes sense.

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