Max Verstappen, Red Bull, Red Bull Ring, 2021

Vote for your 2021 Styrian Grand Prix Driver of the Weekend

2021 Styrian Grand Prix

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Which Formula 1 driver made the most of the Styrian 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 Red Bull Ring.

Driver performance summary

DriverStartedGap to team mate (Q)Laps leading team matePittedFinishedGap to team mate (R)
Lewis Hamilton2nd+0.032s71/7122nd-11.164s
Valtteri Bottas5th-0.032s0/7113rd+11.164s
Max Verstappen1st-0.327s71/7111st-47.434s
Sergio Perez4th+0.327s0/7124th+47.434s
Lando Norris3rd-0.844s70/7015th-45.225s
Daniel Ricciardo13th+0.844s0/70113th+45.225s
Lance Stroll9th-0.212s70/7018th-9.089s
Sebastian Vettel14th+0.212s0/70112th+9.089s
Esteban Ocon17th+0.246s9/70114th+10.86s
Fernando Alonso8th-0.246s61/7019th-10.86s
Charles Leclerc7th-0.154s0/7027th+12.514s
Carlos Sainz Jnr12th+0.154s70/7016th-12.514s
Pierre Gasly6th-0.278s0/10
Yuki Tsunoda11th+0.278s1/1110th
Kimi Raikkonen18th+0.337s50/70111th-14.739s
Antonio Giovinazzi15th-0.337s20/70115th+14.739s
Mick Schumacher19th-0.151s41/68116thNot on same lap
Nikita Mazepin20th+0.151s27/68118thNot on same lap
George Russell10th-0.142s36/362
Nicholas Latifi16th+0.142s0/36217th

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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 2021 Styrian Grand Prix?

  • No opinion (1%)
  • Nicholas Latifi (0%)
  • George Russell (18%)
  • Nikita Mazepin (1%)
  • Mick Schumacher (0%)
  • Antonio Giovinazzi (0%)
  • Kimi Raikkonen (1%)
  • Yuki Tsunoda (0%)
  • Pierre Gasly (0%)
  • Carlos Sainz Jnr (3%)
  • Charles Leclerc (11%)
  • Fernando Alonso (3%)
  • Esteban Ocon (0%)
  • Sebastian Vettel (0%)
  • Lance Stroll (1%)
  • Daniel Ricciardo (1%)
  • Lando Norris (16%)
  • Sergio Perez (1%)
  • Max Verstappen (42%)
  • Valtteri Bottas (0%)
  • Lewis Hamilton (3%)

Total Voters: 177

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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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40 comments on “Vote for your 2021 Styrian Grand Prix Driver of the Weekend”

  1. Pat Ruadh (@fullcoursecaution)
    27th June 2021, 20:00

    Verstappen and Lando were great all weekend, and LeClerc was brilliant from lap 2 onwards, but I’m going for Russell

    1. Even though Russell didn’t finish the race, he is finally showing his strengths on Sundays (before last weekend – France – I don’t recall many strong Sunday’s in the Williams).

      PS – 3% voted for Hamilton?

  2. There are three contenders this weekend. Max Verstappen, Lando Norris and George Russell. Russell gets my vote for getting that Williams so high up on the grid and then lapping with the midfield at the start, although that is a little harsh on Verstappen, who couldn’t have done any better this weekend. Norris was very impressive too, but misses out due to letting Perez and Bottas past, although the team is more to blame for that.
    Leclerc cannot be close to DOTW because of his clumsy mistake hitting Gasly, but still deserves a shout-out as the drive that followed was sublime. Some of those overtakes were just fantastic, and the gap to Sainz was very small considering he had to pit on the first lap.
    And can anybody tell me what happened to Pierre Gasly on that first lap. Obviously he got the puncture from the tiny touch from Leclerc, and collided with Giovinazzi and Latifi as well, but even after that it still only looked like a small puncture. Why, when he got back to the pits, was the suspension broken? Did he drive too fast on the way back, or was there another hit not shown on TV?

    1. Jockey Ewing
      27th June 2021, 20:27

      Idk, at a replay of the first lap I have seen Gasly sliding through a yellow sausage kerb, in a quite bad-looking angle, and that combined with the puncture might gave a bigger hit to the rear wheel or suspension, as it seemed pretty broken in the pits.

      Meanwhile I agree with the ratings.

      With Leclerc and Gasly avoiding this incident, and having an average race of themselves, so a bit better than Leclerc’s results-wise they would be quite close in the points standings to Bottas, huh.
      Although with CL and PG ahead Russell would have had a much smaller chance for points. But this way, Russell’s early DNF took away a lot of amazements, because he was second to Alonso in that train, and he and Alonso could have held up most of the participants of that lengthy train, setting up a remarkable or at least quite unique midfield race. Russell’s DNF took away quite much from the mood for me.

    2. Don’t know but on dutch TV the experts were saying it looked he had been driving too fast to the pits and damaged the car further.

  3. Going for Russell. Qualified 11th. Basically on pole position as far as Williams is concerned. Started well, raced well. Got super unlucky..

    1. He’s still cursed…

      1. Yeah the bad luck thing is worrisome..

        1. It just can’t go away.

    2. Considering he was around tsunoda before pitting, I’m pretty sure points were on the cards.

  4. Clearly Russell. That was top drawer stuff.

    1. Should say that Norris and Verstappen were great again so difficult to choose, but Russell knows these races could decide his F1 career and he delivered when it mattered.

  5. DOTW: VER
    DOTD: LEC, although SAI qualifies equally well.

    1. I can’t agree on LEC today. There was stuff to like, yes. But the incident with GAS was bad and then he does it some more with RAI.

      1. someone or something
        27th June 2021, 21:20

        The incident with Räikkönen was not Leclerc’s fault, though.
        But I agree with the rest: Leclerc finished where he did (behind Sainz) because of his own mistake on the first lap. Everything after that was great stuff, but it makes little sense to say that the driver who sabotaged his own race before recovering most of the ground he lost, performed better than everyone else.

        1. I had a chance to see that again, I agree on RAI.

          1. someone or something
            28th June 2021, 18:15

            I see you don’t need any more convincing, but here’s a short clip of the incident anyway. :)

    2. Who is Sai? The guy gets solidily beaten his whole career yet still gets praise

    3. Certainly some solid actions by LEC, but merely an opportunistic result of a self inflicted reverse grid race for him.

  6. Clearly Max. What’s with all the Lando votes?? He wasnt interested in fighting for his position and settled for… what? Max and RB smashed it

    1. RandomMallard (@)
      27th June 2021, 21:39

      @deanr I think Lando was perfectly correct to do what he did. He was out of position on the grid due to Bottas’ penalty and Perez never being as strong in Quali as the race, and his own heroics in Quali (remember it is Driver of the Weekend, not just the race). He and McLaren knew that the best result they could reasonably get was 5th, and trying to fight otherwise would have just ruined his tyres and compromised his strategy, which turned out to be key because of Sainz’s strong pace throughout the race, especially when he was staying out when everyone else had pitted. He got the best result possible for that car at the moment.

      I can’t deny that Max and RB smashed it, but imo so did Lando and George this weekend.

      1. Agree, considering how good ferrari pace was (imagine leclerc without the crash, he started further ahead than sainz!) any over-defending against merc or red bull would’ve cost norris.

    2. When you create such a gap to a well established teammate like Ricciardo, you must be doing something right.

  7. I went with Lando, but it really could be any of Max, Lando, and George.

  8. Would have been LEC except for that terrible start and hitting a car on basically a straightaway. Impressive recovery but what was he thinking?

  9. Max is a little too obvious. Nothing wrong but nothing too special. Cannot vote for Charles Leclerc although his recovery was superb but he caused the incident that sent him dead last. Carlos Sainz was better on the whole. Checo lacked a bit of pace, he should have got Valtteri. The goat went to pasture. George Russell was doing good but needs a bit more luck. Lando is once again the F1.5 winner (5 of eight races!!) . And Fred was pretty good again. you can’t do much better with an Alpine.

    I’d go for Carlos Sainz, honorable mentions to Lando and Fred.

    1. Max was mega in qualifying. Two tenths up on the number 2 and 0.3 ahead of his team mate.

  10. Voted Norris but Verstappen was great and will get enough votes to win.

  11. Went for verstappen, can’t think of anyone else who was both fast and flawless, I feel like either hamilton underperformed or verstappen overperformed, because I think I’m not the only one who, given an equal car, would expect verstappen and hamilton to be evenly matched, and the same for bottas and perez, yet the latter 2 were very close to each other, the former 2 weren’t, at all. And it’s to be said that I’m aware red bull had the faster car in the race, but still this seems plenty of reason to not pick hamilton.

    Ferrari gave quite some excitement with several overtakes coming up the field, but obviously sainz had a bad qualifying and leclerc was involved in the early crash, otherwise he could’ve been higher.

    I suppose norris would be a good candidate otherwise.

    1. Oh, and ofc russel, silly of me to forget about him: great quali, great race, retired and before that fell back through no fault of his own, I was talking about williams having a chance to finally score points… ofc not! I however before the race would’ve bet against points for williams because there’s too many variables, I certainly didn’t expect a disaster pit stop though.

      Lewis Hamilton (2%)
      Valtteri Bottas (0%)
      Max Verstappen (42%)
      Sergio Perez (0%)
      Lando Norris (19%)
      Daniel Ricciardo (0%)
      Lance Stroll (0%)
      Sebastian Vettel (0%)
      Esteban Ocon (0%)
      Fernando Alonso (1%)
      Charles Leclerc (9%)
      Carlos Sainz Jnr (0%)
      Pierre Gasly (0%)
      Yuki Tsunoda (0%)
      Kimi Raikkonen (2%)
      Antonio Giovinazzi (0%)
      Mick Schumacher (0%)
      Nikita Mazepin (1%)
      George Russell (22%)
      Nicholas Latifi (0%)
      No opinion (1%)
      Total Voters: 88

  12. Max is great but I go for Sainz.
    I can’t believed so many people voted for clumsy Leclerc.

  13. I’m going left field, it was Alonso for me.

    I think this has been his best weekend since his return. He managed to get the Alpine into Q3 while Ocon was knocked out in Q1 and he was a solid top 10 runner all race and never looked like he wouldn’t score points. A very good weekend in a car that looked very much 7th fastest all weekend.

    1. Alonso’s performance seems to be somewhat overlooked. I think his weekend, considering the car, could hardly have been better. Alonso is slowly getting back into his rhythm, which should give Ocon something to think about. I think his contract extension was premature.

      1. @d0senbrot From Ocon’s point of view he seems to have timed his contract renewal perfectly since the last two races he’s been heavily outperformed by Alonso. The question is whether this is a blip or a sign of things to come.

        1. I still don’t understand why Alpine was in such hurry to extend his contract; where else would he have gone (even if continuing to perform well).

  14. ILuvSoundtracks (@)
    28th June 2021, 8:01

    Max Verstappen. Honorable mention to George Russell.

  15. F1oSaurus (@)
    28th June 2021, 9:08

    So when Verstappen cruises to a win in the fastest car he gets dotw, but when Hamilton does it it’s “just because the car”?

    1. At the moment yes. But once he gets his first WDC; which he must be favourite for this year, and it is clearly a two man race between him and Ham in a particular race then it will probably be time to apply the same criteria to Max as many do to Ham. (Taking the performance of the car into consideration during that particular race) Obv some think Max has nothing to prove, so in that case they should be treated the same as of now.

      1. RB don’t has the same speed deficit over Merc as Merc had over RB. MV Q on pole with a gap of 0.196 sec that’s not 0.7 sec as Merc often did for the last 7 years. As long 2 teams batteling for the WDC are in a range of 0.2, max 0.3 the drivers, strategy can make the differents and still win races. This year it was often close and at times Merc was even faster so the mantra it’s the car will arise when the speed deficit of RB is around 1 sec a lap and they win and Q 1-2 the majority of the time

        1. So to put it another way. If Ham got pole by .2s or .3s and then pulled away from Max at under a second a lap during the race; and anyone but Bottas finishes in 2nd, then he (or Max if the roles are reversed) should still be in contention for DOTW?
          Fair enough.

Comments are closed.