The top 10 FIA F3 drivers of 2013

Quality and quantity oozed from the FIA's revived Formula 3 European Championship in 2013. A tense championship fight between Raffaele Marciello and Felix Rosenqvist kept that side of things simmering nicely, and there was even some good racing - something that's never guaranteed in F3!

Referring to the quality, one veteran engineer was even moved to describe it as the best field he's seen since British F3 2001, when Sato, Davidson, Courtney, Lotterer, Priaulx, Bruni, Kiesa, Dalziel, Gurney, Kerr, Doornbos (and BTCC folk hero Rob Austin!) featured on their way to F1 or lengthy careers.

That's why, looking back at the season just gone, it is as hard a selection job as this writer has ever had to choose the top 10 drivers - and move them into the right slots. In any usual year, an extra five or so would have done enough to justify inclusion. Look back at this lot in five years' time, and it'll be interesting to see what they've gone on to achieve...

1 Raffaele Marciello

Prema Powerteam Dallara-Mercedes
Championship position: 1st (489.5 points)
Wins: 13
Poles: 12
Fastest laps: 7

In classic F3 style, Ferrari protege Marciello built his title-winning advantage on the lightning speed that enabled him to score far more pole positions than anyone else, and his ability to convert those into start-to-finish wins.

Such speed was thanks to Prema usually having the set-up spot-on, and the talent of 'Lello' in very quickly building up to the limit.

He didn't seem to have the mental maturity to cope as well as main rival Rosenqvist when things didn't go his way, which meant thrown-away points, but his skill finally meant he had more than enough in hand, especially as the Swede made mistakes of his own.

2 Felix Rosenqvist

Mucke Motorsport Dallara-Mercedes
Championship position: 2nd (457 points)
Wins: 10
Poles: 4
Fastest laps: 10

The above stats tell the story: Rosenqvist was rarely the fastest, but is a fantastic racer who could never be discounted if he qualified anywhere in the front two rows of the grid.

Some in the paddock believe him to be better as an all-round package than Marciello, and it was a very tough decision to place these two. But what can't be escaped is the fact that the Swede made errors of his own - the most costly being at Vallelunga - that slammed shut the title door his own desire and flamboyant driving commitment had prised open.

He also points to the Monza opener - where he missed getting a tow in qualifying - as a crucial setback. He ended that weekend 43.5 points adrift of Marciello and finished the season 42.5 behind...

3 Alex Lynn

Prema Powerteam Dallara-Mercedes
Championship position: 3rd (339.5 points)
Wins: 3
Poles: 5
Fastest laps: 4

Once he'd got a ragged qualifying at Monza out of his system, Lynn's super-smooth style was back, and he added to this armoury incisive overtaking that allowed him to step out of his comfort zone from the British scene and become a top international contender.

His biggest problem initially was starts, most notably at Brands Hatch, where he started the weekend with three poles but ended it with just one win and a potentially nasty shunt.

The fact that he was making lightning getaways by the end of the year proved that he is coping with pressure situations well, as did great wins at Norisring and Vallelunga. A definite title favourite if he sticks around for 2014.

4 Alexander Sims

T-Sport Dallara-Nissan
Championship position: 10th (112 points)
Wins: 0
Poles: 0
Fastest laps: 1

It just never gelled between T-Sport and Will Buller, so when the Irishman quit the team - and there were no good drivers with budgets available to replace him - the perfect choice was the dependable, likeable and very talented Sims.

Of the four rounds he did with T-Sport, he was right in the mix at three of them, while at the other - Zandvoort - he had the disadvantage of not having contested the prior Masters of F3.

A great team player, he always blamed his own driving for not making the top step of the podium, while overlooking the fact that he was with a team new to Europe and the Hankook tyres, with a unique engine and an inexperienced team-mate in the form of Spike Goddard who he helped bring along enormously. A class act.

5 Daniil Kvyat

Carlin Dallara-Volkswagen
Championship position: n/a
Wins: 1
Poles: 5
Fastest laps: 1

In the end, the decision and wherewithal to add F3 with Carlin to his GP3 programme came from Kvyat himself - and it led directly to it playing a crucial role in his Red Bull mentors choosing the Russian for graduation to F1 with Toro Rosso.

Such was the lateness of that decision that there was only chance for one day of testing at Pembrey for Dany - and then he promptly stuck it on pole at Hockenheim first time out.

By the time he claimed his fifth pole, at Zandvoort, he had sussed how to get an F3 car off the line. That performance in particular, having missed the Masters of F3 yet having finally got two full days of testing in at Hockenheim, showed the true talent that simultaneously was changing the shape of the GP3 title race.

6 Lucas Auer

Prema Powerteam Dallara-Mercedes
Championship position: 4th (277 points)
Wins: 1
Poles: 0
Fastest laps: 3

You could chuck Auer, Tincknell and King up in the air, let them fall in any order and probably justify each take on it, but the Austrian gets the verdict because he showed more consistent frontrunning form between the start and finish of the season. He also provided tentative team-mate Marciello with a masterclass in overtaking at Silverstone.

The nephew of Gerhard Berger, Auer looked very promising and, when he inherited a win at Brands owing to Marciello's exclusion, it was widely felt that a 'real' maiden victory would arrive soon.

That it didn't is possibly down to overreaching himself in his bid to win the intra-Prema fight with Lynn for third in the points.

7 Harry Tincknell

Carlin Dallara-Volkswagen
Championship position: 5th (227 points)
Wins: 1
Poles: 2
Fastest laps: 0

The likeable Devon driver's win and double pole at Silverstone was one of the feel-good stories of F3 2013, as the achievements also represented something of a validation of the work the Carlin team had done over the off-season.

He never repeated such form, but his own frequent description of his performances as 'solid' was usually accurate, and it allowed him to finish all 30 races, 26 of them in the points.

He also seemed to make good progress on eradicating his old bugbear of overdriving in qualifying, possibly helped by the Hankooks having a wider peak window of performance. A good driver with a strong pro career ahead of him.

8 Jordan King

Carlin Dallara-Volkswagen
Championship position: 6th (176 points)
Wins: 0
Poles: 0
Fastest laps: 1

With a Formula Renault career that was good rather than earth-shattering, this was quite a step up for King, and in that respect his form was very eye-catching - so much so that he should certainly be a strong title rival to Lynn and Auer if he stays put next season. He obviously has a very good single-seater career ahead.

But if we're strictly talking about 2013, his 51-point deficit to team-mate Tincknell means he loses out - just - in these rankings.

The fact that he beat the more experienced Carlin driver 12-8 during the 20 qualifying sessions proves his promise. The crucial difference was in racecraft, something this seemingly unflappable, calm contender was getting well sorted by the end of the year - to great effect at Zandvoort.

9 Tom Blomqvist

EuroInternational Dallara-Mercedes
Championship position: 7th (151.5 points)
Wins: 0
Poles: 0
Fastest laps: 0

What a shame that Carlos Sainz Jr decided not, after all, to add F3 to his GP3 programme - unlike Kvyat. Sainz was being lined up to join fellow Red Bull junior Blomqvist in the EuroInternational squad, and we'd have got a good read on the Kiwi-raised Anglo-Swede's form.

As it was, Blomqvist's budget was reportedly far from a full one from Red Bull and, with EuroInternational only having stepped up to Euro F3 for 2013, that meant the Italian team was up against it in taking on Prema, Mucke and Carlin.

Blomqvist tried hard and grabbed whatever he could when his racing savvy allowed, and deserves a really proper crack at this level.

10 Sven Muller

Ma-Con/Van Amersfoort Racing Dallara-Volkswagen
Championship position: 9th (122 points)
Wins: 0
Poles: 0
Fastest laps: 0

A shortfall in backing for 2013 meant he couldn't hold on to his 2012 seat at Prema. Muller did a good job within the friendly environment of the small Ma-Con team, but soon began sniffing around for the vacant berth at Van Amersfoort Racing once Mans Grenhagen's sponsorship proved inversely proportional to his quantity of shunts.

On balance he was slightly more competitive at VAR and finally took a deserved podium at Hockenheim, after missing out on one at Vallelunga when he damaged his suspension on a kerb. He almost got one with Ma-Con too, at Brands, but his throttle cable broke.

Good driver who, if funds don't allow him to progress in single-seaters, should be top of any GT team's shopping list as a long-term prospect.

The rest

A snapshot of form from any point in the season would have included any one of four Fortec Motorsport drivers in the top 10, but they all narrowly miss out if you're basing it on the whole season.

Pipo Derani took eighth in the championship and looked particularly strong from late summer onwards. The Brazilian's surge of form provided light relief to the Fortec boys amid a catastrophic sequence of crashes for Felix Serralles, who showed his extraordinary natural ability on slicks on the damp track at Silverstone and looked very good at the spring Hockenheim meeting.

Derani surged in the second part of the season © XPB

Josh Hill belied his late deal and lack of testing with some very encouraging form before deciding that he'd rather be drumming in a retro grunge/punk combo.

Will Buller joined Fortec's European F3 line-up briefly and, if we'd based this top 10 on the opening two rounds, would have made it quite snugly thanks to some reasonable early results with T-Sport.

Eddie Cheever rarely threatened his three team-mates at Prema - he did show some encouraging qualifying form from time to time, but lost out on racecraft.

With Carlin, Nicholas Latifi was a revelation at Silverstone, where his light touch in fast corners was rewarded, but his inexperience meant it was tougher on the more technical tracks. Team-mate Jann Mardenborough was making good progress at times, but the distractions of jumping into LMP2 and GT machinery - while a fantastic opportunity provided by his Nissan mentors - can't have helped him focus on his F3 campaign.

Double R Racing's best contender was Antonio Giovinazzi, who proved his natural talent in tricky conditions and by the end of the season was beginning to look pretty handy in the dry. He, Latifi and Mardenborough all had vertical learning curves and would have proved much better off had British F3 survived in its traditional form.

Once Pascal Wehrlein disappeared off to the DTM after winning at Monza, he was replaced at Mucke by Michael Lewis. The American had a disappointing season and was often to be seen running close with inexperienced team-mates Mitchell Gilbert and Roy Nissany. Gilbert made best progress of this duo.

Lucas Wolf made the most of wet weather for qualifying at the Red Bull Ring to lay the groundwork for an emotional podium finish with the little URD team, while Dennis van de Laar bounced back from a mid-season slump at Van Amersfoort once the speedy Muller was ensconced alongside him.

Season lap time analysis

The fairest way of analysing performance over the European F3 season is to emulate the 'Gary Anderson Supergrids' included before each grand prix in AUTOSPORT magazine.

To that end, for each race weekend we have taken each driver's best lap time - from free practice, qualifying and the races. The fastest lap time of the weekend is expressed as 100, and each driver's best expressed as a percentage of that - thereby weighting each circuit equally regardless of lap length. Each driver's percentages over the season are then averaged.

Marciello was the best qualifier of the season © XPB

This, therefore, gives a season-long performance over a theoretical circuit with an ultimate laptime of 100 seconds (or 1m40s).

What is interesting is that Rosenqvist finishes the season just 12 thousandths of a second behind Marciello, with Lynn also in the same tenth.

Although Marciello had the upper hand in qualifying, Rosenqvist was frequently the speediest racer - and lap times are often quicker in the races than in qualifying in Euro F3, as qualifying takes place before the Hankook rubber from the DTM cars has gone down.

This could also suggest that Rosenqvist's team Mucke Motorsport has a race set-up that is relatively stronger compared to qualifying than the all-conquering Prema Powerteam.

Lucas Auer is predictably close at hand too, while Harry Tincknell and Jordan King may like to dine out on the fact that they edge out Carlin team-mate Daniil Kvyat!

Marciello        1m40.189s
Rosenqvist       1m40.201s
Lynn             1m40.283s
Auer             1m40.316s
Tincknell        1m40.445s
King             1m40.447s
Kvyat            1m40.504s
Sims             1m40.548s
Hill             1m40.629s
Muller           1m40.665s
Blomqvist        1m40.668s
Derani           1m40.784s
Serralles        1m40.787s
Buller           1m40.787s
Cheever          1m40.818s
Grenhagen        1m40.864s
van de Laar      1m40.898s
Mardenborough    1m40.913s
Giovinazzi       1m40.962s
Lewis            1m40.991s
Gilbert          1m40.998s
Latifi           1m41.031s
Nissany          1m41.142s
Wolf             1m41.190s
Goddard          1m41.519s
Rudersdorf       1m41.613s
Gelael           1m41.764s
Zeller           1m42.102s
Calderon         1m42.221s