Start, Yas Marina, 2019

Vote for your 2019 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix Driver of the Weekend

2019 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix

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Which Formula One driver made the most of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix weekend?
It’s time to give your verdict on which driver did the best with the equipment at their disposal over the last three days.

Review how each driver got on below and vote for who impressed you the most at Yas Marina.

Driver performance summary

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Vote for your driver of the weekend

Which driver do you think did the best job throughout the race weekend?

Who got the most out of their car in qualifying and the race? Who put their team mate in the shade?

Cast your vote below and explain why you chose the driver you picked in the comments.

Who was the best driver of the 2019 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix weekend?

  • No opinion (1%)
  • Robert Kubica (0%)
  • George Russell (1%)
  • Pierre Gasly (0%)
  • Daniil Kvyat (0%)
  • Antonio Giovinazzi (0%)
  • Kimi Raikkonen (1%)
  • Lance Stroll (0%)
  • Sergio Perez (12%)
  • Lando Norris (2%)
  • Carlos Sainz Jnr (6%)
  • Kevin Magnussen (1%)
  • Romain Grosjean (0%)
  • Nico Hulkenberg (5%)
  • Daniel Ricciardo (1%)
  • Alexander Albon (1%)
  • Max Verstappen (5%)
  • Charles Leclerc (1%)
  • Sebastian Vettel (0%)
  • Valtteri Bottas (7%)
  • Lewis Hamilton (58%)

Total Voters: 181

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Author information

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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25 comments on “Vote for your 2019 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix Driver of the Weekend”

  1. Hamilton, as if there’s any doubt. Outqualified his team mate despite the latter’s new engine, dominated the race, set the fastest lap and recorded his 6th grand slam, placing him second to Jim Clark on 8. This is the stratosphere of the racing gods.

  2. When a driver scores a Grand Slam, then it’s no competition. Hamilton. That’s it.

    1. Generally speaking, a midfield driver can have a much better weekend than a driver who scores a Grand Chelem with a heavily dominant machinery and a clear#2 teammate. When the playing field is so far from level as it is (and always has been) in F1, you need to go beyond the results when judging who was the best driver.

      1. This is such a bad argument. Anyone can drive around in midfield if the expectations aren’t too demanding. Put some of those drivers in one of the top teams, though, as happened this year at Red Bull, and suddenly that performance can drop off radically. It’s no coincidence that the top 3 teams are now effectively lead by 3 talented drivers, Hamilton, Verstappen and now Leclerc, who can deliver under extreme pressure. Number 2 drivers generally define themselves by simply not being to maintain similar consistency.

        1. Ok well, so get a supremely talented driver on a 2019 Williams and count the Grand Chelems they score

          1. None. Russell may well be supremely talented, who knows? But that has no bearing on the opposite: plenty of good drivers fail to deliver in the top teams because the pressures become to great. Downplaying remarkable achievement is such a life-draining attitude.

  3. How the he’ll did he set the fastest lap when there was so many drivers with fresher tyres afterwards

    1. Not for the first time either. He did this at Silverstone towards the end of that race on hard tires.

      Hamilton drives so efficently that he can save his tires and then drive those ‘qualifiing laps’ at the end,
      as a measure of his concentration.

      Fastest when its least expect all but declares he *is* the best driver out there.

      1. Grand chelem already decided it, but completing it by pulling out the FLAP on ancient tyres made it a no-brainer.

  4. Nearly gave it to Hamilton, who had a very quick car, and a very good, untroubled drive at the front. Finally gave it to Bottas who quietly made up fifteen places and might have done better If the FIA hadn’t screwed up their DRS server.

    1. Michael (@freelittlebirds)
      2nd December 2019, 12:46

      @paul-a yes but we’ve seen the Mercs almost win races starting from the pits – so it’s hardly surprising. Sure Bottas drove well but Lewis might have lapped a Red Bull if he pushed hard.

    2. On the DRS subject- how enjoyable was the part of the race where it wasn’t working? There was still overtaking, and no artificial aftertaste

  5. I don’t think you can go wrong with Hamilton this weekend. Verstappen also deserves mentioning, despite his car not quite working flawlessly, he did cruise up on Leclerc with it and passed him (I don’t hold the start against him, since it seems it’s a thing with the Red Bull cars).

    Bottas also did really well to get through the field, even without DRS to blast past without effort for the first third of the race, and Perez get’s a shout out for again managing to keep the tyres going for long enough to go for softs and fight back up to 6th, well done.

    The last highlight for me would be Norris, clearly outqualifying and in the end also outracing his teammate. His great defence against a much faster Perez really was nice (would have liked to actually see more of it though:-( ), even though he might have made his life somewhat harder with damaging his first set of tyres meaning he stopped quite early.

  6. Grand slams are rare in this day and age. So Hamilton gets a vote.

    1. I feel they would be more common if they actually tried to get them by changing the strategy slightly. For example, If Bottas had pitted after Hamilton in Abu Dhabi 2 years ago, Bottas would have also had a grand slam that time. But as they are a statistic rather than a reward, i guess it isn’t worth the slight risk.

      It is strange, until I looked it up, I was certain Bottas did get a Grand slam 2 years ago as I remember Ben Edwards saying so on the coverage. But I don’t think he realised that Hamilton pitted after him, which was the only reason he didn’t get it.

  7. Probably one of the easiest ones for the season. Hamilton was about as far clear in this as he was on the track.

  8. DOTW definitely HAM, but DOTD PER.

  9. Michael (@freelittlebirds)
    2nd December 2019, 12:41

    Lewis was magisterial once again. The race was hilarious – I think Brundle summed it up best when Lewis talked to the team about what how he could lose the race and then Brundle stated “Lewis has such a lead that he’s now trying to sort out all the permutations” as opposed to racing to keep his lead. He just disappeared and the sister car was really far behind despite having a better race setup.

    1. Michael (@freelittlebirds)
      2nd December 2019, 12:55

      On a sidenote, it’s hard to believe that this is Lewis’s 6th Grand Chelem. Jim Clark has the top spot with 8 but obviously he was Jim Clark and according to Dave Hobbs he would simply disappear after the 1st corner.

      It’s even harder to believe when Vettel and Senna both only have 4 Grand Chelems each – the word only is ridiculous given how high that number is compared to other drivers – and they would both get pole and drive into the distance from the 1st corner never to be seen again.

      Will Lewis get another Grand Chelem or two and eventually tie Jim for top spot? There’s no doubt that to accomplish that you need a special car and a special driver working together in perfect harmony and that might change. I think he can get another one with Mercedes next year but two might be a tall order.

  10. Bottas. A fantastic recovery drive even without DRS. Should’ve been on podium.

    1. I do think it was a more impressive recovery drive than many this year. Especially given this year is so hard to overtake and this track is one of the worst at that. And having no DRS for a 3rd of the race really won’t have helped him. I do actually wonder if he had DRS the whole race with Verstappen haveing his issues, he may have even got close up behind him.

      But it does often seem the case that drivers in top cars starting at the bottom is far more likely to get votes than finishing where you start. I for once was a bit more impressed with this sort of drive as I thought he may struggle to get even close to the red bulls let alone the Ferraris.

      1. Credit to V. Bottas. He trounced my prediction and he deserves accolades for a job well done. A podium would have been fabulous, but there is only one third place and lots of contenders.
        Next year, maybe we will see Bottas 3.0. Hope so.

  11. Hamilton, no doubt. I really don’t want to take anything from Lewis’s masterclass weekend, but then again, the car was so far ahead of the others that I believe most top drivers would have won in that car, on this track, and with the teammate starting last.

    In the end, I gave it to Perez, because he’s always maximizing what he’s got and never settles for less. He qualified 1st of the cars with the ‘free tire choice’ (the best starting position for a car like RP), and in the race he drove exactly what was needed for the contra-strategy to work. And that pass on Norris, even if the tire difference was big, I still think it was really awesome.

  12. Ok well, so get a supremely talented driver on a 2019 Williams and count the Grand Chelems they score

    1. (sorry, misplaced reply)

Comments are closed.