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In F1, for every positive, there is a negative as well.
In one of our latest features, we took a look at every driver's best race weekend in 2022. The beauty of the 22-race calendar that we had last year is that even though there are races where a driver does well, there will be a few where he falters as well.
To err is human, and even the best falter once in a while, although they do it on fewer occasions than most. In this feature, we will glance at those weekends when the best drivers in the world faltered. We will take a look at the worst races of all drivers in the 2022 season.
So without further ado, let's get straight to it.
Every F1 driver's worst race in 2022
Mercedes
Lewis Hamilton - F1 Imola GP
The lowest point of the season for Lewis Hamilton has to be getting lapped by Max Verstappen.
The first part of the 2022 season saw Hamilton struggle quite a bit with the car while George Russell was getting the results. Imola was arguably the worst outing for him as he saw his teammate finish the race inside the top five while he could not even score a point.
George Russell - F1 Singapore GP
Singapore was just shambolic for George Russell in so many ways. Qualifying was bad, the decision to switch to slicks was poor, and the incidents during the race were even worse.
Every driver is afforded one bad weekend and Singapore was the one for Russell.
Red Bull
Max Verstappen - F1 Brazilian GP
The race in Brazil was uncharacteristically bad for Max Verstappen.
He was quite downbeat after the sprint where he lost out to Russell. Even in the race, after the collision with Hamilton, we did not see the characteristic feistiness from Verstappen as he made his way through the field.
Lest we forget, he ended a bad weekend by disobeying team orders as well.
Sergio Perez - F1 Italian GP
Sergio Perez did not have any catastrophically bad races, but the one in Monza was part of a slew of races where he somewhat under-delivered.
The Mexican driver started the race in P13 while both Sainz and Hamilton started the race a few places behind him. To add to this, the Red Bull was clearly the fastest car in Monza as demonstrated by Verstappen.
To not only finish off the podium but behind both Sainz and Hamilton in arguably slower cars was damning for "Checo."
Ferrari
Charles Leclerc - F1 French GP
Time has passed and people have certainly moved on, but Charles Leclerc's crash in Paul Ricard, where he dumped the car into the wall, has to be the error of the season. He had a strong chance of winning that race and it's safe to say that he blew it.
Carlos Sainz - F1 Australian GP
The start of the season was not the best for Carlos Sainz. Continuously getting outpaced by Charles Leclerc, often comprehensively, had started taking a toll on him.
Sainz was pushing too hard and in trying to do so, he ended up in the gravel on the very first lap of the race. The crash ended what had been a very tough series of sessions for the Spaniard in the Ferrari.
McLaren
Lando Norris - F1 Miami GP
Lando Norris had a very impressive 2022 with McLaren and was one of the top drivers of the season. There were blips, however, with one of the biggest being the innocuous coming together with Pierre Gasly that ended the race for both drivers in Miami.
Daniel Ricciardo - F1 Monaco GP
One of the peculiar things about Monaco is that if you don't have confidence in your car, you're not going to have a good weekend. Daniel Ricciardo suffered that fate in 2021 when Lando Norris lapped him and did so once again in 2022 in what was a demoralizingly poor weekend.
Alpine
Fernando Alonso - F1 Miami GP
Starting the race inside the top 10 while your teammate is starting far down the order should mean a strong result is in the offing. A penalty-infusing collision and a post-race penalty meant that this was not the case as Fernando Alonso ended the race outside of points behind his teammate.
Esteban Ocon - F1 Monaco GP
Monaco was a particularly average weekend from Esteban Ocon. While Fernando Alonso was working his magic and keeping a Mercedes at bay all race, Ocon struggled quite a bit. He could not match his teammate's pace and ended up picking a penalty post-race as well.
Ocon appears to have worked a lot on his tendency to have a bad race weekend once in a while, but it still invariably remains. Monaco was one of the races where the French driver had an off-weekend this season.
AlphaTauri
Pierre Gasly - F1 Japanese GP
Pierre Gasly had gotten a little too agitated by the time the season came to a close. He had already secured a future with Alpine and it did appear that he was unable to cope with an uncompetitive AlphaTauri.
Japan was one such weekend. The French driver had an embarrassing show all around and him overspeeding under the safety car didn't help either.
Yuki Tsunoda - F1 British GP
Never clash with your teammate! This was something that Yuki Tsunoda completely forgot as he spun around Pierre Gasly while trying to overtake him during the British GP.
The Japanese driver still had the propensity to crash this year and it was on display at Silverstone this season.
Aston Martin
Sebastian Vettel - F1 Australia GP
It's safe to say that when Sebastian Vettel turned up in Australia this year, he wasn't ready for what was to come.
He had not gotten on top of the car yet. He did not have enough laps under his belt and, to make things worse, the reliability issues over the weekend made things even worse.
As a result, what we saw was an uncharacteristic crash early in the race that ended the German's weekend.
Lance Stroll - F1 Brazilian GP
It's hard to understand what Lance Stroll was doing this season whenever he was in a wheel-to-wheel battle with his teammate. All of this came to a head when Sebastian Vettel was pushed off the track and onto the grass by Stroll and did not get as much as a word from the team radio.
Stroll was very aggressive with Vettel all season in their wheel-to-wheel battles, but he took it a step too far in Brazil.
Alfa Romeo
Valtteri Bottas - F1 Hungary GP
After an impressive start to the season with Alfa Romeo, Valteri Bottas' season nosedived, coinciding with a drop in the form of the car. The Finnish driver had far too many anonymous races during this time.
The race in Hungary was one of them as he ended outside of points and at the bottom of the timesheets.
Guanyu Zhou - F1 Mexican GP
Guanyu Zhou enjoyed an allowance of sorts in the first part of the season as he was still a rookie.
The Chinese driver became more competitive against Valteri Bottas in the second half of the season as the car lost its competitiveness. However, as soon as Bottas picked things up again in Mexico, Zhou was nowhere to be seen.
There were some questions around how good Zhou was and he didn't do much to answer them that weekend.
Haas F1
Kevin Magnussen - F1 Dutch GP
It is hard to find too many performances to fault Kevin Magnussen as he maintained a decent level all season. The race in Zandvoort was an exception though.
While his teammate got through to Q3, Magnussen didn't. The second lap trip through the gravel was not fun either as the Danish driver ended the race in a lowly 15th position.
Mick Schumacher - F1 Monaco GP
It's hard to pick the worst weekend of a season where you have broken the car into two parts TWICE. Since the first incident in Jeddah was in qualifying and hence the German could not take part in the race, the weekend in Monaco stands out.
The conditions were surely tricky and it was an error but the spectacular nature of the crash, in effect, ultimately cost Mick Schumacher his seat at Haas.
Williams
Alex Albon - F1 British GP
Alex Albon had a very strong season to boast of. However, arguably the one race where he should have performed but didn't find its way onto this list.
Albon got upgrades on his car, but a poor qualifying session in the wet weather at Silverstone as Nicholas Latifi reached Q3 did not reflect well. In the end, it was a point-less race for Albon as he could not make up enough ground in the race.
Nicholas Latifi - F1 Italian GP
Contrary to other drivers, Nicholas Latifi had quite a few contenders for this spot but arguably the one that sealed the deal for him was the race in Monza.
Nyck de Vries stepping up on late notice and beating Latifi helped the Dutch driver secure his future in the sport and sealed the Canadian's fate as well.
