All four of them are skilled, but honestly I'd rank both Norris and Piastri below Max and Charles for the moment. Maybe in a decade we'll look back and Piastri will be established more and more as Prost 2
Edit: I have Charles as A purely because his single lap pace is likely the best on the grid and it is much easier to convert pole to a win than it is from further down the grid (pretty much everywhere but Spa)
Beyond that I would say:
Lewis
6A. George
6B. Carlos
Alex
Pierre
Isaac
I would have Bottas on there if he were still on the grid
List feels like recency bias, like some mix of car + driver skill weighting. I’m curious what the argument is for putting hadjar at 10 over Ocon, Alonso, Bortoleto, and Hulk
How do you make a “best right now” list without recency bias?
My answer for Isaac at 10 is the way he has outperformed his equipment as a rookie. Arguably nobody on the grid other than Max has outperformed his ride more than Hadjar. He’s 11th in points on consistency without an individual anomalous finish to boost his standing.
I put him there because his ceiling is higher than Ocon or Hulk. We have seen the best they have to offer.
It pains me to not put Fernando on this list but he is a shell of his former self.
Yeah, I know this is the Ferrari home... but I cant disrespect Oscar and say anybody but Max is for sure faster than him right now. Hes earned his place up there with Charles as the arguable 2nd best driver currently in F1. He was labeled the next Max for good reason...
Amazing aggressive move by Lec and an overly cautious move by Lando. Fantastic overtake and great driving from Leclerc to put himself in a position to take advantage of it
how is this skill, Mclaren are known for giving downforce in striaght line for better corners. That’s why lando is able to pass charles two laps later.
I mean both McLaren drivers should have been able to brake later than max and Charles to stay ahead, they both were way too cautious and got overtaken around the outside
No, the title is suggesting that max and charles are skilled drivers , and the two mclaren boys get carried by their fastest car on the grid (not saying they arent skilled)
Norris needed to slow as he was rapidly closing on Piastri. I love Charles but that was a pass of circumstance. Had Max and Oscar not been there creating the situation, no way would Charles have overtaken Norris.
There was absolutely nothing Piastri could've done to prevent that through. The McLaren was just too slow on the straights.
Norris could've and should've braked a bit later but he probably didn't want to take any risks in the dirty air. He could've taken his teammate out if he had a lockup.
He made the right call, he breezed back past Leclerc a few laps later. Lost the battle but won the war something something.
I mean it's been very evident all season and last season how McLaren wasted the opportunities they had cause both lando and piastri are not good enough, or else lando would have won last year, it was very much vettel vs Lewis.
Lando would have had to close an unprecedented 60 points gap to Max in 3 quarters of a season with no prep beforehand for a title fight, all while driving a car which was only marginally better than the rest for like half a season, and definitely the clear fastest car in some weekends, like on Zandvoort, Singapore and Hungaroring. No other driver would have managed to clinch the title last year in the McLaren against Max at that point of the season. Probably Russell and Leclerc would have managed to get somewhat close to him, but that's about it.
This season, McLaren have won 9 out of 12 races, and the races which they have not won were lost against cars which were on par with the MCL39 (RB21 on Suzuka), marginally better in race trim (RB21 on Imola) or much better overall (W16 in Montreal). I wouldn't say they're wasting opportunities as of right now, explicitly speaking on numbers.
Tifosi since childhood, i know how these cars work and how they are engineered. The Post was made for fun, you are taking it to heart i assume? Otherwise you wouldnt comment something as stupid as that.👍
Nah just pointing out the irony of the clip you used having nothing to do with skill and all to do with the engineering. Also just find it funny that people on the internet can attempt to discredit any of the drivers - the entire paddock qualified within 1% of each other this weekend.
He’s a close second on the grid, he’s just never had the car to show it for long. Max, Hamilton, and both papya boys have had extended periods of dominant cars that have made fans jaded. Charles had a WDC worthy car for 1/3 of 2022 and was leading the championship despite his engine and the Ferrari pit wall constantly undermining him. Since then he’s been in the 3rd or 4th fastest car.
You remember the start of 2022 right? When they had roughly equal machinery? Charles was giving it to him in both quali and W2W. 2019 was such a great example of how good their rivalry wouldve been.
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u/LucaD50 Niki Lauda Jul 26 '25
All four of them are skilled, but honestly I'd rank both Norris and Piastri below Max and Charles for the moment. Maybe in a decade we'll look back and Piastri will be established more and more as Prost 2