Max Verstappen voted best driver of 2022 F1 season by peers as Lewis Hamilton gives it a miss

Max Verstappen has been voted the best driver of the 2022 Formula 1 season by fellow drivers.

The two-time world champion dominated the year and barely put a foot wrong, breaking quite a few records along the way. Noticeably, the Red Bull Racing driver broke the record for the most wins in a season, winning 15 out of 22 races in 2022. This was a record previously held jointly (13 wins) by Michael Schumacher and Sebastian Vettel.

Charles Leclerc finished second, behind Verstappen, while Lewis Hamilton and George Russell were tied for third. Lando Norris completed the top 5 in the rankings, followed by Fernando Alonso, Carlos Sainz, Alex Albon, Sebastian Vettel, and Sergio Perez.

In terms of criteria, drivers were given scores based on the current F1 points system – 25 for the top driver, down to one for 10th. Those scores were then combined to create a ranking.

According to F1's official website, the drivers that took part in the ranking process were Albon, Alonso, Valtteri Bottas, Pierre Gasly, Nicholas Latifi, Leclerc, Kevin Magnussen, Norris, Esteban Ocon, Perez, Daniel Ricciardo, Russell, Sainz, Mick Schumacher, Lance Stroll, Yuki Tsunoda, Verstappen, Vettel and Zhou Guanyu.

Hamilton did not take part in the process and no reason was shared as to why the Mercedes driver opted out.

Ranking	Driver
1	Max Verstappen
2	Charles Leclerc
3	Lewis Hamilton
=3	George Russell
5	Lando Norris
6	Fernando Alonso
7	Carlos Sainz
8	Alex Albon
=8	Sebastian Vettel
=8	Sergio Perez

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Max Verstappen was selected as "Driver of the year" by F1 team principals as well

Max Verstappen is a two-time F1 world champion.

Max Verstappen also won the "Driver of the year" honors, as voted by the various team principals. The Dutchman scored 207 points and was comfortably ahead of Charles Leclerc, who finished second with 144 points.

While the list shared by the drivers appears to be more in line with what many fans would have thought, there were a few surprises in store in the list shared by the team principals.

Lando Norris was placed behind Sergio Perez (who ranked eight according to the drivers) and Valtteri Bottas finished above Sebastian Vettel, which was a bit of a surprise considering the season both drivers had.

While Verstappen and Leclerc in the top two seem to be a common take from both the drivers and the team principals, there was certainly some divergence in how the team principals and the drivers viewed the grid's performance over the course of the season.