2016 F1 Race Rankings

Season Stats:

  • Drivers’ Championship Leader: Nico Rosberg, Mercedes – Drivers’ Champion!
  • Constructors’ Championship Leader: Mercedes – Constructors’ Championship secured!
  • Replacement of the Year: Stoffel Vandoorne, McLaren (Bahrain GP, 10th)
  • The Zero-Points Club: Esteban Ocon, Marcus Ericsson & Esteban Gutierrez (non-active: Rio Haryanto)
  • Most retirements: Monaco Grand Prix (7)
  • Pineapple Chart King: Esteban Gutierrez (5) – Pineapple King!!
  • Dead Last Leader: Esteban Ocon (5) – Dead Last King!! [Non-active: Rio Haryanto, Manor (8)]

The Ranking:

* No ranking for the Singapore Grand Prix because I missed it.

  1. Australian Grand Prix – Nico Rosberg battled his way to victory after the Mercedes cars flubbed their start. Many drivers had technical difficulties. Fernando Alonso’s car was annihilated in a crash with Esteban Gutierrez but luckily walked away from the crash. Lots of technical retirements and Haas drove to points in their first race as an F1 team. Excitement level: Good
  2. Monaco Grand Prix – Lewis Hamilton grabbed a victory from under the nose of Daniel Ricciardo in a race which started behind the safety car due to rain and on a drying circuit. Embarrassing incidents ended the races for Renault and Sauber, the Virtual Safety Car was deployed many times and two more drivers threw their hat in the championship race. Excitement level: Good/okay
  3. Spanish Grand Prix – Max Verstappen took his first win in his first Grand Prix at Red Bull. Ferrari took the rest of the podiums after the Mercedes drivers crashed out of the race. Tight scuffles, even if the race calmed down towards the end. Excitement level: Good/okay
  4. Canadian Grand Prix – Lewis Hamilton took his second victory of the season after a close starting bout with Vettel. Valtteri Bottas rose to the podium for the first time and Max Verstappen battled Nico Rosberg. Excitement level: Okay
  5. Austrian Grand Prix – Lewis Hamilton took the victory after being first run into by his team-mate, making this one of the most exciting finales of a race. Some good scuffles up and down the field, Vettel’s tyre exploded violently leading to a safety car session and Manor scored its first point thanks to Pascal Wehrlein. Excitement level: Okay.
  6. Bahrain Grand Prix – Nico Rosberg took an unchallenged victory which saw Kimi Räikkönen battle his way back to the podium after a flubbed start as well as Hamilton rising back to third despite making full contact with Valtteri Bottas. Stoffel Vandoorne, who substituted for Fernando Alonso, took McLaren’s first point of the season. Decent scuffles all along the field. Excitement level: Okay
  7. British Grand Prix – Lewis Hamilton took an unchallenged victory in a race where radio instructions took Nico Rosberg’s 2nd place podium away. Wet conditions caused lots of slip ups. Excitement level: Okay
  8. German Grand Prix – Lewis Hamilton took a victory after his team-mate slipped on the pole and Red Bull took its first double podium of the season. Some good scuffles and lots of pit slip-ups but otherwise a pretty steady race. Excitement level: Okay
  9. Brazilian Grand Prix – The race was held up numerous times by heavy rain. Lewis Hamilton claimed victory with Max Verstappen rising to the third podium on the final laps from last place. Felipe Nasr also scored Sauber’s first points in the second to last race of the season. Whenever the safety car came off track, there was a lot of action. Excitement level: Okay
  10. Malaysian Grand Prix – The Red Bulls took a surprise double-victory when Hamilton’s car broke on the last leg of the race. Daniel Ricciardo beat his team-mate for the finish. Some collisions and incidents down the field but, for the most part, a standard race. Excitement level: Okay/slightly boring
  11. Belgian Grand Prix – Nico Rosberg took an unchallenged victory in a Belgian GP which was red flagged after Kevin Magnussen spun at full speed into a tyre barrier. Verstappen nearly bowled Räikkönen and Vettel out of the race, Hamilton rose from the back to a podium and Force India landed both drivers in the Top-5. The race was very entertaining at the start but then calmed down towards the end. Excitement level: Okay/slightly boring
  12. Russian Grand Prix – Nico Rosberg slipped away to his fourth victory. Some impressive rises from the back with Renault scoring its first points and McLaren’s regulars also scoring points for the first time in the season. Beyond that, quite an uneventful race. Excitement level: Okay/slightly boring
  13. Chinese Grand Prix – Nico Rosberg drove to another easy victory in the Chinese round which had a chaotic start with plenty of collisions, but amazingly no retirements. After the chaotic start the race got a bit boring. Danny Ricciardo and Kimi Räikkönen fought valiantly to improve their points at the end. Excitement level: Okay/slightly boring.
  14. Mexican Grand Prix – Lewis Hamilton achieved another unchallenged victory despite going wide in the first corner. A largely uneventful race except for the final few laps where the war between Vettel and Verstappen escalated over the radio. As a result, Verstappen and Vettel both lost a podium to penalties with Ricciardo taking the podium after the race (and the victory celebrations). Excitement level: Okay/slightly boring
  15. Abu Dhabi Grand Prix – Despite Lewis Hamilton’s season ending victory, Nico Rosberg secured the championship on a 2nd place finish in a mostly dull race. In the end, Hamilton slowed down intentionally to try to get other drivers to catch up to the Mercedes pair but this never happened. Intense mind-games from Hamilton, a sad retirement from Button and several small team drivers bumping into each other, but over-all not that exciting of a race. Excitement level: Okay/slightly boring
  16. United States Grand Prix – Lewis Hamilton drove to an unchallenged victory while McLaren and Toro Rosso repeated their best result of the season. Räikkönen and Verstappen both had rotten luck due to carelessness and technical issues. Some action but not enough to keep you awake. Excitement level: Slightly boring
  17. European Grand Prix (Azerbaijan) – Nico Rosberg got back on the victory trail in a mostly uneventful Baku Grand Prix. Hamilton was plagued by technical difficulties and Räikkönen lost a podium to a careless error. Pascal Wehrlein at least put up a decent fight before his retirement. Excitement level: Slightly boring
  18. Hungarian Grand Prix – Lewis Hamilton passed Rosberg at the start, drove to an unchallenged victory and took the championship lead. Beyond some scuffles between Räikkönen and Verstappen, the Hungarian GP was a real snore-fest this year. Excitement level: Boring.
  19. Italian Grand Prix – Nico Rosberg drove to an unchallenged victory thanks to Lewis Hamilton’s poor start. Very little action. Excitement level: Flatline.
  20. Japanese Grand Prix – Easy victory for Nico Rosberg in a completely uneventful Japanese round where Mercedes secured the constructors’ championship. Excitement level: Six feet under.