planetf1.com

The results from Mexico:



Scores for the year:

Hamilton 15-4 Bottas (69/31)
Vettel 12-7 Raikkonen (56/44)
Ricciardo 7-12 Verstappen (43/57)
Perez 7-11 Ocon (47/53)
Stroll 13-6 Sirotkin (63/37)
Hulkenberg 9-9 Sainz (55/45)
Gasly 14-5 Hartley (72/28)
Magnussen 11-8 Grosjean (66/34)
Alonso 16-3 Vandoorne (88/12)
Ericsson 6-13 Leclerc (31/69)

- Lewis Hamilton records TMW victory 15 of the year, as well as being his 11th TMW win from the last 12 races. A strange irony I noticed is that this ridiculous run of form stretches back to the French GP, where a certain Sebastian Vettel punted Bottas out on the first lap. At that point, it was 4-3 to Lewis in the TMW vote and Bottas had seemed to be keeping him honest. While Bottas getting spun and Lewis going on to dominate the rest of the season are obviously not related, it's a nice little irony nonetheless!
- After two races which saw Kimi recording his first back-to-back TMW wins since the middle of the season, Seb has responded nicely and taken the TMW honours in Mexico. In doing so, it prevents Kimi from stringing together a run of three TMW wins for 2018 for the first time (and with only two votes left, prevents him from achieving that at any point in 2018).
- One driver who isn't struggling to string TMW wins together is Max Verstappen. He might not have had his way in qualifying but from lights out in Mexico, he dominated the race and claimed TMW win #12 of 2018, as well as his 11th in the last 13 races. It makes you wonder how much closer to Seb he would've been had his performances earlier in the season not been so... crunchy.
- At Force India, while the percentage remains close, Sergio Perez still trails quite significantly in terms of TMW wins. However, two victories in the last three races have at least improved the outlook for him, reducing the gap to four with two races to go. Given how close the percentages are, it is theoretically possible that he could yet equal that side of things (he trails by 26 votes for the season).
- After having a decent run of TMW results in the middle of the season, it's all gone to дерьмо for Sergey Sirotkin. Lance Stroll claims his fifth TMW decision in the last six races, which you can also extend to six in eight races, or even eight in eleven races if you go back a little further. While he might be a match for the Canadian in qualifying, it looks like for the majority of us, there's a clear advantage for Lance when Sunday rolls around.
- In the last write up, I mentioned how close the Renault TMW was, and that with three votes to go and the pair tied at 9-9, if one of the remaining three votes ended in a draw and then they split the other two, they could theoretically finish 2018 tied at 10-10. What I wasn't actually expecting was that one of those races *would* end as a draw, yet that's exactly what happened in Mexico! It means that Hulk and Sainz remain deadlocked at 9 TMW wins each, albeit with Nico still holding a sizeable advantage on the percentage side of things. It's also only the second tie we've had all season, the other being the two Force Indias in Germany.
- One driver who I think would be happy to even tie a TMW vote is Brendon Hartley, as his Red Bull-bound teammate takes TMW win number 14 on the season. It leaves Hartley as the only driver not to have won two consecutive TMW votes.
- Romain Grosjean's renaissance continues! Whilst the percentages look awful, it is now 11-8 for the season, something few of us would've predicted after K-Mag rattled off six successive TMW wins to start the year. At this point, Haas do look justified for having given the Frenchman the opportunity to continue with the team into 2019, and with Marcus Ericsson losing his seat at the end of the year, who knows, maybe Romain might be involved in a few less incidents at the start of next year?!
- Has hell frozen over? Because Stoffel Vandoorne has won back-to-back TMW votes! Now admittedly, in terms of his give-a-damn meter, Fernando Alonso is probably a lot closer to the 'sitting by the track in a deck chair' end of the scale than he is the 'pushing his car into the pits in qualifying' end. But hey, let's let Stoff have his moment!
- Lastly but not leastly, Sauber. Charles Leclerc grabs his sixth TMW victory in a row, extending his advantage for 2018 to 13-6 and continuing to do a very good job.

(Better late than never - been absolutely swamped at work so this is the first lunch break I've had since before the Brazilian race! Should be quieter next week so I'll hopefully get the Abu Dhabi vote up a little quicker.)

_________________
Pick 10 | 1st x3, 2nd x3, 3rd x7
2018: 5th | 2017: 6th | 2016: 8th | 2015: 2nd | 2014: 15th | 2013: 17th | 2012: 11th

Thanks again for doing these!!

_________________
Mission WinLater

Leclerc votes are very unfair in this case. Similar to Ericsson in Spa. Did Ericsson do better that Leclerc in Spa because he got outqualified then finished in the points? We can't compare them. Just like here. from what we can compare, In qualifying, Ericsson was convincingly better. He was also 1 of only 2 drivers in the top 10 who improved in their 2nd q3 run. And he did beat Leclerc. His car broke before he started the race and was mented by superglue. Then it didn't handle well at all and he had to retire. No matter how well Leclerc did, we can't just say based on most occations that he will have done better than Ericsson here. It just wasn't fair to compare them. Out of the only fair thing we have, Ericsson for once was clearly better. Either Ericsson should be the one people go for or don't vote as the race didn't really happen for Ericsson.

I'm not saying Leclerc's drive wasn't great, but remember what the votes are for here? Comparing team mates. And the only time Leclerc looked good (or better than Ericsson) was when Ericsson couldn't be.