Max Verstappen produced another flawless weekend topping all sessions before crushing his opposition to win the 2023 Spanish Grand Prix from old adversary Lewis Hamilton.
George Russell picked up his podium of the year with third ahead of Sergio Perez and Carlos Sainz, whilst Lance Stroll scored some excellent points for Aston Martin, finishing sixth.
Total-Motorsport.com rate all 20 drivers based on their qualifying and race performances at the Spanish GP.
Team errors such as a slow pit stop or poor strategy do not affect our ratings as they are no fault of the drivers. Instead, our ratings solely look at how well the drivers got on throughout the weekend in Spain.
F1 Driver Ratings – Spanish GP 2023
Max Verstappen 10/10
Started: 1st – Finished: 1st
Verstappen makes perfect in Spain, topping every session and producing a crushing pole lap before dominating the race with relative ease despite warnings for track limits.
Lewis Hamilton 8.5/10
Started: 5th – Finished: 2nd
An excellent weekend for Hamilton, who recovered from an ok qualifying to finish a well-earned second, albeit well adrift of Verstappen.
George Russell 8/10
Started: 12th – Finished: 3rd
Poor qualifying aside, Russell had a good weekend in Barcelona, carving through the pack and securing his first trip to the rostrum in 2023.
Sergio Perez 6.5/10
Started: 11th – Finished: 4th
Yet again, another Qualifying disaster puts Perez on the backfoot for Sunday’s race, and although he managed to pick up some good points, his drive wasn’t anything to shout about.
Carlos Sainz 7.5/10
Started: 2nd – Finished: 5th
Following a tricky run of races, Sainz can be pleased with how he performed on home soil, qualifying an excellent second before losing ground in the race after falling victim to both Mercedes.
Lance Stroll 7.5/10
Started: 6th – Finished: 6th
With the debacles of Miami and Monaco behind him, Stroll enjoyed a clean weekend in Barcelona, finishing ahead of teammate Alonso after briefly running third.
Fernando Alonso 7/10
Started: 9th – Finished 7th
Although he couldn’t deliver a fairytale result, Alonso had a good weekend despite Aston Martin’s lacking in race pace before playing the team game helping Stroll secure sixth by backing off.
Esteban Ocon 7/10
Started: 4th – Finished: 8th
Following his Monaco heroics, Ocon was in a prime position to make it back-to-back podiums following a good qualifying performance. Sadly Alpine’s race pace wasn’t strong enough.
Zhou Guanyu 7/10
Started: 13th – Finished: 9th
With the Alfa Romeo much more at home on a permanent circuit, Zhou finally secured solid points despite coming off second-best in his battle with Tsunoda.
Pierre Gasly 4.5/10
Started: 10th – Finished: 10th
Fourth on the grid could have translated into a good result for Gasly if he hadn’t clumsily impeded Sainz and Verstappen in qualifying. Unfortunately, the race wasn’t much better, but tenth was some consolation.
Charles Leclerc 5/10
Started: 19th [from pits] – Finished: 11th
Nothing went right for Leclerc in Spain, as a Q1 exit condemned his weekend to becoming a fruitless pursuit of points which never arrived.
Yuki Tsunoda 5/10
Started: 15th – Finished: 12th
Tsunoda was gutted to miss out on Q3 but had seemingly made up for it by dragging the AlphaTauri into top 10 until he made contact with Zhou, earning him a five-second penalty.
Oscar Piastri 5.5/10
Started: 10th – Finished: 13th
Q3 was a welcome bonus for Piastri, but he simply couldn’t hold onto points as McLaren’s pace limitations returned with a vengeance.
Nyck de Vries 5/10
Started: 14th – Finished: 14th
Solid weekend’s work for De Vries, who out-qualified his teammate despite a Q1 spin. However, the race was an anonymous affair continuing his point’s draught.
Nico Hulkenberg 4.5/10
Started: 7th – Finished: 15th
One lap pace had looked good for Hulkenberg and Haas, but this didn’t translate into points, with a poor stop adding insult to injury.
Alex Albon 5/10
Started: 18th – Finished: 16th
With Williams still struggling for speed, Albon couldn’t achieve much apart from salvaging some pride and bringing the car home in one piece.
Lando Norris 6/10
Started: 3rd – Finished: 17th
A surprise third in qualifying at a track where McLaren was expected to struggle raised expectations for the race until contact with Hamilton on Lap 1 ended all chance of points.
Kevin Magnussen 4/10
Started: 17th – Finished: 18th
An anonymous weekend for Magnussen, who struggled throughout and had to fight for scraps in the race.
Valtteri Bottas 3.5/10
Started: 16th – Finished: 19th
Bottas’ poor run of form continued in Barcelona as he simply didn’t have the pace to challenge for points, whilst his less experienced teammate did.
Logan Sargeant 3/10
Started: 20th [from pits] – Finished: 20th
Yet again, Sargeant was rooted to the back, as a crash in FP3 put him on the backfoot for Qualifying. Another Q1 exit and drive to last followed suit.
