Carlos Sainz Jnr went to the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix fourth in the standings, looking to secure his best-ever championship finish in Formula 1.
But over the course of the event he suffered only his second points-free race weekend of 2023 and managed to drop three places in the points table to seventh. He is the first driver to fall more than two places in the standings at the final round of a season for well over two decades.The last time a driver experienced a worse end to their season than this the circumstances were controversial to say the least. In 1997 Michael Schumacher arrived at the season finale leading the world championship, but was excluded from the final standings from the championship results for dangerous driving after colliding with title rival Jacques Villeneuve while trying to stop him taking the lead.
Prior to that the last time it occurred was in 1979, when Jean-Pierre Jarier dropped from eighth to 11th in the standings at the United States Grand Prix. The non-score for Sainz – who had run as high as third during the race – also meant Ferrari failed to claim second in the constructors’ standings. He only needed to score three points – equivalent to eighth place, or ninth plus fastest lap – for his team to overhaul Mercedes.
Verstappen won by 8.771 seconds in 2022, and his victory margin almost doubled this year to 17.993s: A fair reflection of how dominant his 2023 has been compared to his still dominant season last year. It was the shortest ever Abu Dhabi Grand Prix as it was completed in 1:27’02.624. The changes to the circuit in 2021 were a factor in this: The shortened, simplified layout has a much quicker average speed.
Ferrari has not won any of the 15 editions of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. They took their fifth second places at Yas Marina circuit since first visiting in 2009.
Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and
It is one of nine races in F1 history which Ferrari have contested multiple times, made the podium at but never won. The team have picked up two second places from the eight editions of the Russian Grand Prix, and have finished second once in the Detroit Grand Prix out of seven attempts.
Verstappen’s 54th grand prix win means he surpasses Sebastian Vettel’s career tally. Only Lewis Hamilton and Michael Schumacher now have more wins than Red Bull’s star driver.
It was a record-extending 19th of the season as well for Verstappen, and his 27th win from pole. He extended his current winning streak to seven rounds, which is the joint third longest in F1 history, and has now gone unbeaten at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix for four years running. If he wins it next year he will match Hamilton and Ayrton Senna’s shared record for the longest unbeaten streak at any F1 race.
It was the 11th hat-trick (victory, pole and fastest lap) of Verstappen’s career, putting him level with Jim Clark in third on the all-time list. The victory also meant a record-extending 21st podium of the season. Verstappen ends 2023 having reached the podium in 52.97% of the grands prix in his F1 career. he reached the landmark 50% figure at the Hungarian Grand Prix.
Much noise was made about how he altered his strategy to end the year on more than 1,000 laps led, having led 20 of the 22 grands prix in 2023, but there was another grand figure he reached as he has now scored 1004 points consecutively.
Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and
Verstappen extended his unbeaten run in qualifying in Abu Dhabi to four years, and his 32nd pole drew him level with Nigel Mansell in seventh place in the all-time list. It was his 12th pole of the year, the joint sixth most in a season, and his 30th fastest lap also put him level with Mansell. With that being his ninth of the campaign, he matched Mika Hakkinen’s 2000 tally as the fourth-highest in a single season.
Mercedes’ George Russell took his 11th podium in third place, putting him level with Chris Amon, Patrick Tambay and Jarno Trulli. His 43rd points finish matched Elio de Angelis and Juan Manuel Fangio. He has now finished third eight times, just like world champions Phil Hill, Emerson Fittipaldi and John Surtees.
Sixth place for Oscar Piastri brought the McLaren driver’s season tally of points up to 97, the second-largest haul for a rookie in F1 history. Hamilton’s title-fighting 2007 campaign remains the benchmark with 109 points under a much less generous scoring system. He took the record from Jacques Villeneuve who scored 78 points in his own title-contending rookie season in 1996.
The only other drivers to have surpassed Villeneuve’s tally in their first full seasons in F1 have been Romain Grosjean (who scored 96 points in 2012 after making seven F1 starts in 2009), Esteban Ocon (who scored 87 in 2017 after contesting the last nine races of the previous season) and Alex Albon who scored 92 points in 2019.
Fernando Alonso took his 250th grand prix points finish in seventh place for Aston Martin, and the team failed in its objective of beating McLaren to fourth in the constructors’ standings. But it still smashed the record for the most points scored by a fifth-placed team in the champion, with their total of 280 being 99 more than what McLaren achieved in 2014 and Renault in 2020.
Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and
After the race Alonso claimed “this is the best season ever for the team as well with whatever name they had before”, but the Silverstone-based squad came fourth in the championship as Racing Point in 2020, did the same in 2016 and ’17 as Force India. Nor were these its best results: Back in 1999 it took third in the standings under its original identity, Jordan.
AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda became the 181st driver to lead an F1 race. He is the second Japanese driver to achieve the feat, after Takuma Sato spent two laps at the front of the 2004 European Grand Prix. Tsunoda has spent three seasons in F1 and only got one top-five finish in that time, and it took 63 starts before he could add leading a lap to his CV. That at least was not a record, since Nick Heidfeld did not lead an F1 race until his 91st attempt at the 2005 European Grand Prix. Tsunoda’s team mate Daniel Ricciardo recorded his 200th grand prix finish in 11th place.
Despite now being on the third longest scoring run of his career, and joint seventh longest of all time having scored in the last 22 races, Hamilton’s ninth place (which was his 300th grand prix finish) means the Mercedes driver has now gone three rounds without a top-six finish for only the third time in his 17-year F1 career. The first time was a spell of five rounds in 2009 where he scored zero points and had a best finish of ninth, then in 2012 he was put out of the European Grand Prix by a clash with two laps to go, finished eighth in the British Grand Prix then retired with a puncture at the German Grand Prix.
Haas failed to score any points in Abu Dhabi, consigning them to 10th and last in the constructors’ standings. However they still became record-breakers having scored 12 points this year. That’s the most ever for a team in last place. The points record for the last-placed team in the standings was eight, first achieved by Toro Rosso in 2009 and then Williams in 2022. Ferrari only scored eight points when they came 10th in the standings in 1980, but they finished ahead of five other teams.
Have you spotted any other interesting stats and facts from the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix? Share them in the comments.
Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and
2023 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix
- Mercedes’ team photo shows we still have a long way to go on diversity – Hamilton
- Why luck was a factor in Perez’s penalty for “joke” comment
- Bottas and Zhou see encouraging signs from overhauled 2024 car
- Only Verstappen got the best from his car every weekend, rival team bosses admit
- How Sainz suffered the worst season finale for a driver since Schumacher in 1997
F1statsfan (@f1statsfan)
29th November 2023, 18:11
2023 Stats:
• There were no new Grand Prix winners or polesitters in the 2023 Formula 1 season. It was the first time this occurred since 2018. 2023 is only eighth season in total to have no new polesitters or winners at main events in F1 history. 7 F1 race winners had a winless season
• First time since 1952 that no British driver or team has won a race during the season
• Max Verstappen raced all 1,325 Grand Prix laps in the 2023 Formula 1 season, becoming only the third driver to complete every lap in a single year.
Other Stats:
• Counting from 2017 the Netherlands is now the most succesful country in F1 with 53 wins closely followed by UK with 51 wins and Germany/Finland in joined 3rd with 11 wins each.
• Counting the 21st century Germany is still the most succesful country in F1 with 138 wins (1 more than all but top 3 countries together), in 2nd place is UK with 126 wins and in 3rd place is the Netherlands with 54 wins.
• Various websites and Wikipedia are indicating Max broke Lewis record of most consecutive points scored with 1,004 points in 41 consecutive races however unlike those websites I believe Lewis still has the record with 1,008 points in 48 races not 998 points.
Max 2023 records:
• Most wins in a season with 19 wins and highest % wins with 86.4% beating Ascari’s 75% or 85.7% if you exclude Indy500 from 1952.
• Most laps lead in a season with 1,003 laps and highest % laps lead beating Clark’s 71.5% from 1963.
• Most points scored in a season with 575 points (521 without sprint/FLAP) and highest % of points avaiable (counting all races) with 92.7% beating Schumacher’s 84.7% from 2002. Using current point system without Sprint & FLAP Max has 94.7% of maximum points, 2nd is Schumacher with 89.4% and Clark is 3rd with 84.8%.
• Biggest points gap to 2nd with 290 points beating Vettel’s 155 from 2013, also in % the gap is a record with 2nd Perez scoring 49.6% of Max. In 1992 2nd Patrese scored 51.9% of Mansell and in 1997 2nd Frentzen scored 51.9% of Villeneuve.
• Most wins from pole position in a season with 12 beating the 9 achieved by Mansell in 1992 and Vettel in 2011.
• Most consecutive wins from pole position now set at 16.
• Most hatricks in a season with 6 beating the 5 achieved by Ascari in 1952 and Schumacher in 2004.
• Most podiums in a season with 21 beating his own record of 18 podiums in 2020
• Most consecutive top 2 finishes with 15 equalling Schumacher’s 2002 run from Brazil to Japan.
• Most consecutive top 5 finishes with 23 equalling Schumacher’s 2001-2003 run from Hungary to Australia, Lewis is 2nd with 22 consecutive top 5 finishes from Silverstone 2018 to Silverstone 2019.
• Most races as championship leader with 39 races beating Schumacher’s 37 in 2002
• Champion with most races left with 6 races equalling Schumacher in 2002
• Winning a race with most pitstops with 6 pitstops equalling Jenson Button win in Canada
• Max extended his record for most wins in last 20 races to 18 wins, Schumacher is 2nd with 15 wins.
• Max extended his record for most wins in last 50 races to 37 wins, Schumacher and Lewis are 2nd with 31 wins.
• Max has surpassed Lewis is highest point scoring average per race weekend with 13.98 versus Lewis 13.97.
Simon
29th November 2023, 18:19
Thanks @f1statsfan :)
Bart
29th November 2023, 19:28
I checked, and indeed Hamilton did score 1008 points in 48 consecutive points scoring races. Unless he got a 10 points penalty somewhere which I don’t remember.
fixed that for you ;)Hamilton has raced 126 races as championship leadre, followed by Schumacher with 121 (source: Stats F1)
melanos
30th November 2023, 0:03
but consecutive?
Sumedh
30th November 2023, 3:38
McLaren did win the Qatar sprint though.
Jere (@jerejj)
30th November 2023, 6:33
Sumedh Sprints aren’t actual races, & don’t feature national anthem playing.
Jonathan Parkin
30th November 2023, 11:49
No, they are technically Sprint Sessions as per the sporting regulations
MichaelN
30th November 2023, 11:59
Plus Red Bull is a very British team. They just use an Austrian license, but as far as I know not a single bit of their cars is made or designed in Austria.
Jere (@jerejj)
29th November 2023, 18:52
Max Verstappen, in addition to being the only 2023 full-time driver to reach the chequered flag in all 22 races & thus achieving a single-season 100% finishing record for the first time in F1, he’s also on the longest ongoing finishing streak at 41 races, with his most recent retirement occuring in the 2022 Australian GP, so nearly two full seasons without a DNF.
Fernando Alonso finished fourth in the drivers’ standings on the countback of having two more third-place finishes than Charles Leclerc.
Additionally, he brake-tested someone for the third time in his F1 career after brake-testing DC in the 2003 European GP or during that event & Robert Doornbos (iirc) in a 2006 Hungarian GP Friday practice session.
Ironically, he was in a race lead for two fewer laps than Yuki Tsunoda despite a considerable car advantage over the season & achieving several podium finishes.
VER, RUS, HAM, OCO, GAS, PIA, NOR, BOT, STR, ALO, ALB, & SAR remained within their PU component allocations throughout the season, & all bar VER, MAG, HUL, & TSU remained within their gearbox component allocations.
The season finale became the sixth entirely SC & VSC-free 2023 race, following the Miami, Spanish, Belgian, Italian, & US GPs iirc, although not the third race with all drivers reaching the chequered flag, even if the third with all drivers classified as finishers.
melanos
30th November 2023, 0:30
Being accused by a certified liar does not make the accusation a fact. The stewards, with all the telemetry data available to them, dismissed the accusation a nd no penalty was given. End of.
DRS has perverse effects. Not only most overtakes are supremely boring highway passes. Worse yet, sometimes two drivers compete to be the slowest and cross the DRS line last. This can easily end in tears (Jeddah 2021 e.g.).
What Fernando Alonso did was lifting somewhat before the DRS line, this is not the same as brake testing) while leaving all the width of the track (he was almost totally out of the track on the left shoulder). The other driver did not take the bait and slowed also while keeping behind while lying on the radio, and crossed the line last. To no avail. the liar lost in the end.
There was a very similar move in Montreal 2013, gut the other way around. And Fernando Alonso won that one too.
There was another instance in which FA lifted ever so slightly (NOT brake-tested) in the Escida dos Boxes, first lap, Interlagos 2007. The then-rookie liar behind panicked, lost control of the McL, went out to pasture and lost about eight positions. This would prove decisive, a WDC in the making was lost there (well, half there and half in the hallowed ground of Shanghai’s diminutive gravel trap).
melanos
30th November 2023, 0:56
Oh, and btw the 2003 incident at Nurburgring in which David Coulthard lost control of his car behind FA was also investigated. The fact that he braked earlier than usual was attributed to his tyres being almost totally worn out (it was lap 57 of a 60 lap race) and again no penalty was given. So no official braketest there.
The Friday practice incident with Robert Doornbos at the Hungaroring 2006 was the only one penalized for “dangerous driving” and so the only official instance of braketesting by FA (although the words is not used by the FIA). He got 2 secs added to his quali time, and although he made the best Q2 time, he did not progress to Q3 and started 15P. Which somehow was lucky because he raced an incredible first lap with 11 overtakes and was leading early in the race.
Tommy C (@tommy-c)
30th November 2023, 7:22
Schumacher was on the podium at every round of the 2002 season so also achieved a 100% finishing record.
F1statsfan (@f1statsfan)
30th November 2023, 9:02
As per my own stats post:
“• Max Verstappen raced all 1,325 Grand Prix laps in the 2023 Formula 1 season, becoming only the third driver to complete every lap in a single year.”
3 drivers managed to race every single lap in a season, Max in 2023, Schumacher indeed in 2002 and Hamilton in 2019 although with a bit of luck of the end of race safety car during the eventful German race else he likely would have been a lap down and outside top 10.
F1statsfan (@f1statsfan)
30th November 2023, 9:08
“he’s also on the longest ongoing finishing streak at 41 races”
This is indeed Max longest streak but he is still 7 races away from tying with Hamilton’s 48 race finishing/point scoring streak from 2018 British race to 2020 race in Bahrain scoring a total of 1,008 points.
Max currently has scored 1,004 points although 66 of those points came from sprint races. Purely looking at main race points Lewis scored 996 (excl 12 points for FLAP) = 20.75 per race and Max has scored 924 (excl 14 points for FLAP) = 22.54 points per race.
See my own stats post:
• Various websites and Wikipedia are indicating Max broke Lewis record of most consecutive points scored with 1,004 points in 41 consecutive races however unlike those websites I believe Lewis still has the record with 1,008 points in 48 races not 998 points.
Bart
29th November 2023, 18:55
He gained a place on the last lap! Only after the finish was his 5 second penalty applied.
Practically, with that penalty looming he wasn’t better than 4th ever since he got it after the collision with Norris.
paulgilb (@paulgilb)
29th November 2023, 22:45
First time Hamilton has missed Q3 in consecutive races since Germany and Hungary 2014.
Sainz’s first Q1 elimination since Brazil 2019 (when he finished on the podium).
Bottas has managed two Q1 exits and two Q3 appearances in the last 4 races.
Albon has outqualified Sargeant in every race this season – the first time this has happened since Verstappen outqualified Albon at every race in 2020.
Perez has equalled Verstappen’s career total of 34 penalty points.
Verstappen has led as many laps in 2023 as McLaren led in 1988.
First time the final race of the season has seen every driver classified.
Second season in a row where Zhou has finished 18th in the standings with 6 points.
First season since 2011 in which Mercedes have not won a race as a constructor, and first time since 2006 in which they have not won a race as an engine supplier.
Thanks to statsf1 and the official F1 site for some of these.
First season since 2005 in which no British driver won a race.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
30th November 2023, 2:31
I like the albon verstappen sargeant stat, albon took revenge on sargeant for what verstappen did to him!
F1statsfan (@f1statsfan)
30th November 2023, 9:15
“Verstappen has led as many laps in 2023 as McLaren led in 1988.”
Shows how incredible dominant that McLaren was in 1988.
McLaren lead 1,003 of 1,031 laps in 1988 = 97.28%
In terms of % laps lead, Red Bull is a distant 2nd in the ranking with 1,149 of 1,325 laps = 86.72%.
Mercedes in 2016 is the only other team that has lead more than 1,000 laps 1,055 of 1,268 = 83.20%. In 2014 Mercedes % wise was more dominant leading 978 of 1,134 laps = 86.24%
Mercedes also lead more than 80% in 2015 and in 2020 the only other team to lead more than 80% of the laps was Williams in 1992. The 2002 Ferrari came close with 79.36%.
Sumedh
30th November 2023, 11:38
The Ferrari 2002 stat gets spoiled by refueling. Different drivers would lead the races simply because they were on a 1 stopper.
F1statsfan (@f1statsfan)
30th November 2023, 12:37
Not really that much different than what we see today between 1 or 2 stopping or 2 and 3 stopping.
See the 5 laps lead by Tsunoda.
Actually worse as you also have effect of soft, medium or hard tire starting whereby someone might go longer than the front runners on hard tires.
The stat that really is getting spoiled is Fastest lap and with that hattricks and grand slams.
These day the FLAP is often set by those that due to incident pit late in the race for fresh tires or if they have a large enough gap to pit for fresh tires (happened less in 2nd part of 2023).
MichaelN
30th November 2023, 12:20
And that’s on their very last parts.
I guess it shows how far within the margins everyone is, and reliability is basically ‘solved’.
ben (@dubaemon)
29th November 2023, 23:04
This honda engine is incredibly reliable.
From where they started they are the unsung heroes of this dominance, of their own doing.
Has there ever been a longer run of finishes without a dnf?
Anuj Chopra
30th November 2023, 8:12
Mercedes I believe would have much longer runs. Most of the time their DNFs were not engine failures
MichaelN
30th November 2023, 12:21
They are unsung in part because there is no competition allowed on the engine front. Nobody praises Brembo for their brakes either.
Tommy Scragend
30th November 2023, 0:10
17.993 is more than double 8.771!
melanos
30th November 2023, 1:13
False, it was 2nd after Schuey (who also got a 2 sec penalty for overtaking under red flag and also did not progress to q3 and started P12)
Schuey’s first lap from P12 was also great to watch. And then he was the only real obstacle in FA’s progress to the lead. There was a 3-lap long highly enjoyable battle until FA overtook Schuey in the outside of P5, a breathtaking move.
melanos
30th November 2023, 1:15
sorry misplaced it, this was a correction on my 00.56 post above
Jonathan Parkin
30th November 2023, 11:54
Also Williams have now completed in seven seasons without a top six finish, unlike their historic rivals McLaren who never have
Keith Campbell (@keithedin)
30th November 2023, 14:21
Hamilton crashed out of Qatar on the first lap, so he can’t be on a long points scoring streak, unless we are also including sprint races and he therefore scored 4 points for 5th on that race weekend. But it would seem to me you either include sprints in the streak, in which case they both count as a race and can break a points scoring streak, or you don’t include them at all in which case they don’t count as a race, but a points score in them cannot continue a streak if you fail to score in the grand prix.