2017 F1 Season Compendium

I was on Joe's/Max's side, but the season's over and Ricciardo (6 DNFs) beat Max (7 DNFs) by 32 points.
Still, I'd say Max is slightly better than Bottas and Raikkonen

2017 : overall very good F1 season :up: looking forward to 2018

This is not the best season for RB. With so many DNFs, it's difficult to make a proper assessment. Remember Kvyat beat Ricciardo in points once, but hardly anyone would agree Kvyat is the better driver! ;)

I think Daniel is a much more consistent driver... and Max is not quite as consistent, but capable of out shining his teammate at times. Assuming that Max won't go the same path as Kvyat and becomes more consistent, I'm sure he'll be better than Vettel.

Max at least put some pressure on Ricciardo, I only recall Ricciardo running all over Vettel back when they were teammates...

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DPkb61sXcAAfygi.png

Only three #F1 world champions have scored points in every single race of a title-winning season

1954: Juan Manuel Fangio

2002: Michael Schumacher

2017: Lewis Hamilton

Has anyone else ever scored points in 20 races in a season? (Seasons were shorter in the old days).

I know every year there is the hope that another constructor can rise up to challenge the mighty Merc and Ferrari teams. I would love to see the Renault guys step up their game and even the gap while providing excellent reliability as well. I even think Honda stepped up their game near the end of this season and gave a more reliable product.

And being the newly crowned Max fanboy around here (I guess I could say RBR fanboy too because honestly who doesn't like Daniel?), I would love nothing more than to see Ricciardo and Max have a competitive, reliable machine next year.

But the facts are probably leaning toward status quo. Merc and Ferrari will get even better...leaving the gap for Renault to fill even larger. RBR, Renault and McLaren have the chassis to compete if only the power unit is on par with the others.

IF (big IF) that happens then oh boy are we in for some fun next season. Imagine half the field running equal power and reliability (5 teams)...that would be insane.

We already have NASCAR and Indycar for the supposed leveled playing field series. :p

I think F-1 should really separate drivers and constructors. 20 drivers, 20 cars, 20 races. Every driver get to drive every car... at the end of the season, you end up with a true driver champ and the manufacturer champ... and perhaps the bottom 1/3 or 1/4 can be eliminated to make room for up and coming youngsters.

What I'm hoping will, and by all rights should, happen is the law of diminishing returns. As Mercedes and Ferrari move towards the peak of possibilities with the current engine formula any gains will be come more incremental. No doubt some of the changes they've made over the past two seasons have been measured in double digit HP or torque gains or single percentage efficient gains. As time goes on these advances will start to slow down and become 3-5% then 1-2% while Renault and Honda are still making the big jumps that Mercedes and Ferrari have already made. This then means that while MB might make a 5HP gain Renault make a 10HP one, closing the gap. This is why changing engine formula regularly is a bad idea. At the end of the NA V8 era it's reckoned most manufacturers engines were within 10HP of each other. Eventually they all evened out, although the development freeze did have something to do with that, but even then MB, Renault etc said NA engine development was hideously expensive with millions spent for tiny fractions of improvement.