The F1 season is heading towards its conclusion, and every driver on the grid wants to finish the year ahead of the other side of the garage. Some pairings are finely balanced, with all to play for in the final three races, while others are totally one-sided with no chance to change.
So, here is a rundown of the battles for supremacy, team by team.
Red Bull: Max Verstappen v Sergio Perez
This one is a done deal. Verstappen has a massive 17-2 advantage over Perez in qualifying – including 10 poles to Perez’s two – and it is the same 17-2 balance in races (albeit Perez with two retirements to Verstappen’s zero). The odds of Perez retiring a third time are 12/1.
The reigning world champion has netted 18 podiums, while Perez has achieved just eight – a disappointing return given the level of machinery at his disposal. As for points, Verstappen has more than double his team-mate’s haul at 491-240.
Mercedes: Lewis Hamilton v George Russell
It is a far more balanced battle at Mercedes with all to play for in the final three races – at least in qualifying, that is. It is 10-9 to Hamilton on a Saturday (or Friday at Sprints!) but the experience of the seven-time champion shows in the races, as the balance moves to 13-6.
Russell has perhaps not performed as had been hoped in what has at times been a difficult second season at Mercedes. He has just one podium to his team-mate’s six and when it comes to points, Hamilton has secured 69 more than the younger Briton’s 151. Hamilton is 9/1 to win this weekend.
Ferrari: Charles Leclerc v Carlos Sainz
Leclerc is one of the best single lap drivers in the business, and that shows with a 12-7 advantage over Sainz in qualifying and four poles to his team-mate’s two. In the races, however, they are more closely matched.
Leclerc still has the advantage on a Sunday, but narrowly so at 10-9 with both drivers failing to finish twice and Leclerc also disqualified once. When it comes to points, however, Sainz is ahead on 183 to 166 with more higher-placed finishes. Odds of a double podium are 12/1.
McLaren: Lando Norris v Oscar Piastri
Norris was top dog at McLaren last season and despite some impressive performances from newcomer Piastri, the British driver has retained that status. He has a comfortable upper hand on every statistic and is 15/8 to finish in the top two this weekend.
Norris wins the qualifying balance 13-6 and the races 15-4 while he has secured six podiums to Piastri’s two and collected almost double the points at 169 to 87. However, Piastri has one stat that Norris would love – he has a pole and a win…just that was in the Sprint in Qatar.
Both drivers have also been helped in races by their team’s speed in the pitlane. The crew broke the pit stop record at 1.8s in Qatar and they are chasing down Red Bull in the ‘championship’ for pit stop performance. Odds of them going fastest again are 2/1.
Aston Martin: Fernando Alonso v Lance Stroll
Alonso started the season as a title contender but the team has failed to keep pace with its rivals’ upgrades and is now fighting down at the wrong end of the top ten. Alonso has retired from the last two races and the odds of both cars getting in the points this weekend is 7/2.
Alonso has totally dominated Stroll – even more so than Verstappen has Perez. He has more than TRIPLE Stroll’s points with 183 to 53, he has seven podiums to Stroll’s zero and he has bettered the Canadian in qualifying 17-2 and in races 16-3. Now that is dominance.
Alpine: Esteban Ocon v Pierre Gasly
When Gasly joined Alpine at the start of the year, much was made of this partnership – would it fire up or explode? The two French drivers are not the best of friends, but they have battled hard Gasly currently has the upper hand.
Gasly has bettered Ocon in qualifying 12-7 and races 10-8, with 11 more points at 56-45. However, Ocon – who is 25/1 to make the last pit stop this weekend – has six retirements to Gasly’s one and has been ahead in three of the last four races.
Williams: Alex Albon v Logan Sargeant
If you thought Verstappen was the most dominant driver on the grid, think again. That award goes to Alex Albon – particularly in qualifying, where he has a 19-0 lead on his American team-mate and is even becoming a regular in the top 10 shootout.
Albon’s advantage is similar to that ex-Williams driver Russell had over Nicolas Latifi. He has a 16-2 advantage in races and although Sargeant got his first point in the US – he is 12/1 to get another in Brazil – Albon has clocked up 27, with two ninth places in the last two races.
AlphaTauri: Yuki Tsunoda v Daniel Ricciardo
Tsunoda has had three different team-mates this season. He comfortably bettered Nyck de Vries for half the year but has had a tougher time against Ricciardo, who stepped in mid-season, and Liam Lawson, who substituted for five races when the Australian broke his hand.
Ricciardo stunned at the last race in Mexico by putting himself fourth on the grid and ending up seventh – by far the team’s best result of the year. It is currently 2-2 in qualifying and races, but the Australian could be in for more points in Brazil and is 20/1 to get in the top six.
Alfa Romeo: Valtteri Bottas v Zhou Guanyu
This pairing sits very much in favour of former Mercedes driver Bottas, with a ratio of 12-7 in both qualifying and the races. The Finnish driver has only scored points once more than his Chinese team-mate, but the value of those was higher, putting him at a 10-6 advantage.
Bottas finished the first race in eighth as the team showed plenty of promise, but that has faded as the season has gone on. Zhou finished ahead of Bottas at the last race in the US, so there could still be a chance to even up that balance but Bottas is 9/4 for a points finish.
Haas: Nico Hulkenberg v Kevin Magnussen
F1’s journeyman Hulkenberg joined Haas with high expectations this year, but he was up against a tough team-mate in Magnussen. He has done the business, however, with a 13-6 advantage in qualifying and an 11-8 advantage in races. Magnussen qualified on pole in Brazil last year, but his odds of doing so again are 500/1.
Hulkenberg has scored more points than his team-mate 9 to 3 – but that does not tell the full story, as Magnussen has had three points finishes while Hulkenberg’s points have all come from seventh in Australia plus a sixth place in the Austrian sprint race.
Keep track of the action
To keep track of the action, wherever you are, the F1 Live Tracker from bet365 is a good place to go – covering all the information you could possibly need, from all the practice sessions, through qualifying, sprints and the race itself.
It allows users to track each driver’s position from the starting grid to the finish, live throughout the race, with current leaderboard information, the latest fastest lap, current lap times, number of pitstops by driver, current tyre settings and driver gaps.
To make it simple to catch up, a timeline details all the important race updates – including all the key overtakes and incidents – and it also allows two drivers to be compared head-to-head within the race, highlighting them on the tracker.
On top of that, all the safety car updates, red flags and yellow flags are covered, while track information such as temperatures, humidity and chance of rain makes it possible to keep tabs on potential changes and challenges and more easily predict what could happen.
