[Iestyn Davies]

I just had the thought to use the F1Fanatic driver rankings to do an analysis and see if that would match my own predictions of a team mate battle, like the thread currently on the main page!

2013:
Vettel – 1
Alonso – 2
Raikkonen – 3
Hulkenberg – 4
Hamilton – 5
Rosberg – 6
Grosjean – 7
Button – 8
Ricciardo – 9
Di Resta – 10
Perez – 11
Webber – 12
Sutil – 13
Bottas – 14
Massa – 15
Bianchi – 16
Maldonado – 17
Vergne – 18
Gutierrez – 19
Pic – 20
Van der Garde – 21
Chilton – 22
Kovalainen – 23/NA

So, from this, we can add them together to get team scores, and see which is the strongest pairing of 2013:

Red Bull – 13
Mercedes – 11
Ferrari – 17
Lotus – 10 (or 30 with Kovalainen as stand-in)
McLaren – 19
Force India – 23
Sauber – 23
Toro Rosso – 27
Williams – 31
Marussia – 38
Caterham – 41

It is fair to say that many, including myself, would’ve said that Mercedes had the strongest line up for 2013. However, given Grosjean’s spectacular return to form, it now appears that Lotus had the strongest line up, which correlates with my understanding of them losing the WCC places (plus £17.5m in prize money, to their direct competitors, who are better funded anyway) through team mistakes, not driver errors. Red Bull’s car is the best and so they win at a canter, while Ferrari could have beaten Mercedes with a better second driver, and even Montezemolo has finally conceded this. Behind, everything falls into place, even if a team is based on one strong driver or two evenly matched team mates.

The only exception is Marussia, where Bianchi netted them 10th in the WCC with the car in good form early on in the season. His gaining them £4m in extra prize money for 2014 likely paid his salary or any costs to Ferrari (who probably gave them cheaper engines for running Bianchi otherwise). Caterham’s double rookie ‘pay driver’ line up was indeed the worst on the grid, as Marussia ran at least one ‘non-pay driver’ (by most people’s standards), and may have cost them £4m for 2014. But, if they brought in more than £4m, then surely Caterham have profited on what they would have otherwise paid out to Kovalainen, as a salary, through sponsorship.

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Now, from this driver data we could also predict the 2014 driver pairings!

Red Bull – 10
Mercedes – 11
Ferrari – 5
Lotus – 24
McLaren – 18-26..
Force India – 15
Sauber – 32 (Sutil and Gutierrez)
Toro Rosso – 27-35..
Williams – 29
Marussia – 38
Caterham – 41

As the rookies are an unknown quantity, we can either give them a rookie average score for 2013 of 18, or the same as the best rookie from this year – Bottas’ 14. Considering both new rookies are promising junior series champions, like all of them this year except for Chilton, this could be apt, else there is also an average of the entire grid – Webber’s 12, which is possibly too high for a rookie, but scores are skewed slightly by car, and Magnussen is joining a top team in theory. We could even give them the scores of the closest driver who is leaving the grid to their likely position, e.g. Magnussen gets Di Resta’s 10th, Kvyat gets Webber’s 12th, or swap Vergne to 12th to give Kvyat 18th, or even boost Maldonado in a Lotus up to one of them and leave the others to the rookies..

Anyway, it is immediately clear that Red Bull are more competitive with Ricciardo, who should beat Webber’s points score for 2013 (including 2 pole positions). Ferrari have leapt into having the best driver pairing seen in a long time, to try and secure a WCC, while Lotus and Sauber have worse line ups under financial pressure. Williams have strengthened, after getting enough of Maldonado’s backing as severance to improve their driver line up slightly, and must be hoping to outscore Toro Rosso and Sauber next year for 7th place. Sauber must hope Toro Rosso aren’t fast, or they could well be as low as 9th next year, unless Vergne and Kvyat struggle. Marussia could beat Caterham again (and this is where the huge money, literally £20m, starts to roll in), if they keep the same or a better line up, and Tony Fernandes knows this, hence his wanting to bring an on-form Kovalainen back to the car for 2014. But, as ever, at the back it mainly depends on how competitive the car is. If either car is slow, then it could well be just £10m in prize money (Column C) for either Marussia or Caterham in 2015.

It is also apparent that the 2014 monetary pressures have in effect produced a 4-tier system amongst the teams for driver combos:

Top teams: Ferrari, Mercedes, Red Bull
Midfield teams: Force India, McLaren, Lotus
Lower midfield: Williams, Toro Rosso, Sauber
Backmarkers: Marussia, Caterham

This tells us that, with the 4th strongest driver pairing on the grid at the current time, Force India must be fancying 5th place ahead of Lotus in 2014. This does of course hinge on the car’s intrinsic pace, but they must be confident after spending so long on it (mid-season onwards). Lotus have to hope that not only Maldonado’s cash rescues them in 2014 but that he stops making mistakes and brings them a regulat points haul (like Grosjean did in the second half of 2013). The lower midfield depends on how the Toro Rosso rookie and car gets on, while McLaren’s car should in theory put them clear in 4th place at least. If not, it could be a struggle to beat Force India once more.

Red Bull will have tough competition on the driver front again, so will definitely have to produce a stellar car package once more to win the WCC in 2014. Interestingly, if Red Bull took Raikkonen, they would have 4, while Ferrari would have had 6 with Hulkenberg. So, they paid a lot more for a driver advantage, but must be hoping that that extra edge will hand them them a title once more. It’s also obvious now why Horner (and many fans) wanted to see Vettel take on Raikkonen, as we could have had another Prost/Senna battle, something we are now going to see at Ferrari in 2014!

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