F1 Driver Ratings: Spain 2020

Lewis Hamilton led from start to finish as he took his 88th victory in Formula 1 and broke Michael Schumacher’s podium record in the process.

Max Verstappen managed to split the Mercedes at the start on his way to second place. Another third for Valtteri Bottas saw him lose more ground to Hamilton and Verstappen in the championship although he did set the fastest lap of the race as a consolation.

Remarkably everyone apart from the top three was lapped. Racing Point had a great day with fourth for Lance Stroll and the returning Sergio Perez in fifth.

As always, the order below is the finishing order of the Grand Prix.

2020 Spanish Grand Prix – Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya

Lewis Hamilton: 9.5/10

Max Verstappen: 8.5/10

Valtteri Bottas: 6.5/10

Lance Stroll: 7.5/10

Sergio Perez: 8/10

Carlos Sainz: 8/10

Sebastian Vettel: 7/10

Alexander Albon: 3.5/10

Pierre Gasly: 7/10

Lando Norris: 7/10

Daniel Ricciardo: 7/10

Daniil Kvyat: 6.5/10

Esteban Ocon: 6/10

Kimi Raikkonen: 8/10

Kevin Magnussen: 7/10

Antonio Giovinazzi: 6/10

George Russell: 6/10

Nicholas Latifi: 5.5/10

Romain Grosjean: 6/10

RETIRED

Charles Leclerc: 7.5/10

Lewis Hamilton was the class of the field and when he is in that kind of form he’s unbeatable.

The six-time champion always goes well around Spain and on Sunday he used his tyres very well to get the best out of the Pirelli rubber. Mercedes are so good at rectifying any weaknesses they have and Hamilton talked about how he debriefed for hours after the second Silverstone race to understand what went wrong.

On track he executed things beautifully and he even called the strategy to use the medium tyres in the final stint.

At the other end of the scale is Alexander Albon. Lapped by his teammate just like Pierre Gasly was in Austria last year and despite Red Bull getting the strategy completely wrong Albon was poor all weekend.

To be seven tenths behind Verstappen on a circuit which all the drivers have done hundreds of laps on and the teams know so well is dire.

You can argue that all he has to do is to improve qualifying but the problem for Albon is it does not look like happening. Just once has he qualified within 0.4 of Verstappen from the 15 races they have had together.

Something else which most people will not have noticed is Albon needed four runs just to get into Q3 whereas Verstappen needed two. He just was not quick enough and it costed him with tyre usage going into the grand prix.

In the race he was put out in traffic but the real hurt for Albon was when Carlos Sainz was able to drive away from him despite both drivers being on medium tyres.

The Red Bull is clearly quicker than the McLaren and yes the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya is hard to overtake on but Albon could not get near to Sainz after the battle they had initially. His pace in Spain was very disappointing.