Former Mercedes driver, 2016 world champion Nico Rosberg, named his top five drivers of the past season…
Nico Rosberg: “The 2022 season was dominated by one rider, but that didn’t make it boring at all. Changes in the regulations worked as planned, greatly facilitating overtaking. Ross Brown and his colleagues have done an excellent job. Just look at the catch-up stats – 785 in 2022 versus 599 a year earlier.
I will give first place to Max Verstappen – he performed at an incredible level. He was fast, stable and made no mistakes. His car wasn’t the fastest in qualifying, but he won 15 races out of 22 this year – not a record achievement – in 2004 Michael Schumacher won 13 races out of 18, but impressively. Max is sure to be in the top five best drivers of all time – along with Senna, Hamilton, Schumacher, Fangio and Prost.
Second place I would give to George Russell. In his first season with Mercedes he was very stable behind the wheel of a very difficult car to drive. As the team experimented with the settings, he confidently finished in the top five in almost every race of the season. He was able to get ahead of Hamilton at the end of the season – and no doubt deserves respect.
Third place went to Charles Leclerc. At the beginning of the season, he actively fought for the championship title, after which the team abandoned him. However, he also had a few flaws that are unacceptable when you’re fighting for the high score. Charles deserves second place at the end of the season, there’s no doubt about that.
In fourth place I put Lewis Hamilton. He had a lot of bad luck in 2022, especially in the first half of the season. Had it not been for this bad luck, he would have been tied with George in points, and might have come out ahead. In the second half of the season, when the car started, it was very fast and had some incredible races. If Mercedes has a fast car next year, Lewis can fight for the title.
The last place in the top five is for Lando Norris. He did a great job and he certainly deserves it. We all know how fast and good Daniel Ricciardo is, but in the last two years Lando has consistently outperformed him. In fifth place could be Fernando Alonso, who had a lot of bad luck with the reliability of the car this year.
Source: F1 News
I am Christopher Clyde, an experienced journalist and content writer with a passion for sports. I have been writing about Formula 1 news for the past five years and am currently employed as an author at athletistic.com, one of the top sports websites in the US.
