How the best and worst races of F1 2023 stacked up to 2022

We all know the 2023 Formula 1 season was not a classic when it comes to the championship ‘fight’, thanks to Max Verstappen’s domination. But what about the individual races? How did they stack up to recent seasons?

Once again, Autosport teamed up with author Roger Smith to rate each of the races – or perhaps grands prix would be more accurate since sprints were not included. There are plenty of ways to rate races, but we took on the challenge.

As before, each race was scored across a range of factors, including how incident-packed it was, titanic battles, shock factor, an exceptional performance and the conditions/other circumstances. Smith’s final ratings were created from the average of the top three relevant ‘highlights’ from that list. The average of that and Autosport’s own score was then taken as the final mark out of 100. When a race averaged a .5 score, it was rounded up to the nearest whole number.

The average score of the 2022 races, the first year of the ground effect regulations designed to improve the racing, was 67%. That was very close to the 66% (69% if the non-event of the Belgian GP is removed) of 2021. So, what about 2023?

PLUS: How do the best races of F1 2022 stack up to 2021?

Incredibly, the average score comes out at 65%. That’s not bad considering 2022 had the semblance of a championship fight for the first half of the season, whereas Red Bull won every race except one in 2023.

One of the key reasons for this similar score despite the domination is how most of the field closed up in 2023, as you would expect in the second year of a ruleset. A look at the supertimes reveals that trend.

Supertimes are based on the fastest single lap by each car at each race weekend, expressed as a percentage of the fastest single lap overall (100.000%) and averaged over the season. That gives a bias towards qualifying, when the fastest laps of a weekend are normally set, and so downplays Red Bull’s race pace advantage in 2023, but it is still useful for general trends.

Photo by: Erik Junius

Red Bull's 2023 domination may have dampened the action but the season still rates favourably compared to recent years

While the gap between the first and second fastest teams grew from 0.022% in 2022 to 0.235% in 2023, the rest closed up. Fifth-quickest Aston Martin was 0.795% behind Red Bull, better than Alpine’s 1.22% deficit to the front when it was fifth fastest in 2022. Williams was the slowest in 2022, 2.396% away from the front, but the Alfa Romeo that propped up the 2023 stats was 1.584% behind. It’s perhaps no surprise, then, that we saw some good racing down the field and the order behind Red Bull changing from race to race.

This could help to explain why the worst races of 2023 scored a little higher than those in 2022. The 2023 Spanish (52%) and Azerbaijan (53%) GPs were ahead of the 2022 Azerbaijan (42%) and Japanese (46%) GPs. The 2022 Suzuka event was hurt by rain delays, but the point is that the closing up of the field behind Red Bull meant there was usually something to entertain in 2023.

The fact that 2023 scored an average of 65% compared to 2020’s 60% also underlines the action provided by teams behind the dominant pacesetters.

The relative closeness of the grid overall meant most GPs were perfectly decent. But what is really needed for the big scores is more unpredictability at the front. And that means more of a challenge to Red Bull

Nevertheless, the highest-scoring races are almost always those with a proper lead battle. It’s surely no coincidence that, of the four years we have rated, 2021 returned the highest average of 68% and that was the closest title fight in recent times. And that’s where last season falls down.

The highest-scoring 2023 GPs featured two of Ferrari’s best performances, in Italy (83%) and Singapore (82%), plus the British GP (78%) in which McLaren’s Lando Norris led the early stages and gave the home fans something to cheer.

Closely following those were the Las Vegas (76%), Dutch (75%) and Brazilian (74%) GPs. Putting the race at Interlagos to one side, that covers the main events at which Red Bull faced its sternest challenges, showing that a battle at the front is one of the key metrics. The fighting behind can be close, but it is of course lead contests that we all want to see.

PLUS: The 10 best F1 race drives of 2023

Brazil could be regarded as the exception because, despite Norris’s game chase, Verstappen never looked like losing. What saved the race and boosted the score was Fernando Alonso’s stern defence – and then dramatic attack – against Sergio Perez in the battle for third.

Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

Alonso vs Perez in Brazil was a 2023 highlight - but it being a fight for third rather than victory drags the score down

2023 GP Ratings

Italian GP: 83
Singapore GP: 82
British GP: 78
Las Vegas GP: 76
Dutch GP: 75
Brazilian GP: 74
Qatar GP: 71
Mexican GP: 69
Belgian GP: 63
Japanese GP: 62
Saudi Arabian GP: 62
Abu Dhabi GP: 62
United States GP: 61
Miami GP: 61
Canadian GP: 59
Australian GP: 58
Bahrain GP: 57
Monaco GP: 56
Austrian GP: 55
Hungarian GP: 55
Azerbaijan GP: 53
Spanish GP: 52

Surprising or unusual winners of close contests usually provide the biggest scores. Carlos Sainz’s win in a dramatic British GP grabbed 88% and top score in 2022, while Esteban Ocon’s victory for Alpine in Hungary in 2021 managed a season-high 89%.

Pierre Gasly’s 2020 Italian GP victory (92%) has only been topped since the COVID-19 pandemic by that year’s Turkish GP (93%). Although that race was won by Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes, which was hardly a surprise given the context of that season, it was one of his greatest drives and came amid an action-packed, rain-affected contest.

Now that we have four years of data, we can also take a tentative look at the best-scoring venues. The drama-filled 2020 Sakhir GP that took place on a different layout and featured Perez’s brilliant win for Racing Point scored 85%, but looking at the circuits that have hosted more than one GP since 2020 gives a clearer picture.

Interlagos (82%), Silverstone (80%), Marina Bay (79%) and Monza (78%) have been the highest average scorers over the past four years, while of the 2023 events Spa (43%), Monte Carlo (51%), Abu Dhabi (53%) and Suzuka (54%) are the worst. It’s not a great showing having three classics in the bottom four and Spa’s score would only increase to 54% if 2021 is ignored.

Monaco is not known for throwing up regular thrillers; it’s more about the history and driver challenge, with the odd ridiculous race every few years, while Spa and Suzuka would surely climb the list if we went further into the past. Rating all the world championship races since 1950 has to be the ultimate goal, providing we can find the time!

As for 2023, the relative closeness of the grid overall meant most GPs were perfectly decent. But what is really needed for the big scores is more unpredictability at the front. And that means more of a challenge to Red Bull. Roll on the Bahrain GP in March…

Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool

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