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Red Bull's RB19 did what not many cars in the history of F1 have done - it decimated the field! After the very first race of the season, it became apparent that Red Bull had something in its hands and the competition had messed up big time. As a result, after the first race, Mercedes driver George Russell proclaimed that the Red Bull car would win every race of the season.
Looking back at the 2023 F1 season, the car almost did win every race of the season. Throughout the season, Mercedes was arguably one of the teams that was quite vocal in proclaiming that Red Bull had the most dominant car ever in the history of the sport.
Lewis Hamilton claimed early in the season:
“I’ve definitely never seen a car so fast. I think when we were fast, we weren’t that fast. I think it’s the fastest car I’ve seen, especially compared to the rest.”
In the last race of the season in Abu Dhabi, Hamilton's Mercedes teammate Russell was questioned about the task at hand for the team. Talking about his team's prospects and the mountain of a challenge that it faced, Russell also claimed that the Red Bull was the dominant car in F1 history.
"I think the task for everybody is massive. We're all trying to catch up to the most dominant car in F1 history, That's no short task, and everybody's going to have to come together, really focused, really put everything into it and time will tell," he explained.
It's hard to deny that what Red Bull achieved with this car was brilliant. But is the RB19 the most dominant car ever? To answer this question we'll have to go back and scroll the pages of history. There have been some dominant McLarens of its time, there have been a few Williams designed by Adrian Newey that were more than a second clear of the second fastest car in the field as well.
In the past, there have been teams that have pulled out this magnificent advantage over their competition. However in the 21st century, with the restrictions being applied on what one can and can not do on a car, the gaps have been reduced. Hence, we're looking at the modern era of F1 and trying to find out whether the Red Bull is the most dominant car in the history of the sport.
In this feature, we will be evaluating the dominant teams of the 21st century to see which one comes out on top. Since 2000, F1 has seen as many as 5 extended periods of dominance.
- Ferrari(2000-04)
- Red Bull(2010-13)
- Mercedes(2014-20)
- Red Bull(22-present)
To find a better understanding we'll break the most dominant seasons down into numbers based on certain criteria.
Criteria
When we talk about the criteria to evaluate the dominance of a car in a season, we'll take a look at the parameters you can see in the table below. We'll take a look at the number of pole positions secured by the car as well as the number of wins.
To add to this, however, we'll also attribute every race that was lost by the respective teams in one of the three categories. Either the team lost a race because the car was just not good enough to win or there was a mistake from the driver/the team/ or the combination just underperformed and finally there was some reliability issue.
Once we've done that, the emphasis will be on the pole position, race win percent, and finally, the percentage of races that the car could have won.
With the criteria now defined, let's take a look at the respective teams and their most dominant seasons.
Ferrari
In Ferrari's five-year reign, the two years that stand out as the most dominant are the ones in 2002 and 2004.
2002
In 2002, as we can see from the table Ferrari won 15 of the 17 races and got pole at 10 of the 17 races. In the two races it lost, the car was beaten fair and square in Malaysia and Monaco.
In terms of percentages:
- Wins: 88%
- Poles: 59%
- % Wins that the car should have won: 88%
2004
Coming to the 2004 F1 season, Ferrari's numbers were somewhat similar. The car won 15 races out of 18 and got 12 pole positions. All of the three races lost were the ones where the car was just not on the mark.
In terms of percentages:
- Wins: 83%
- Poles: 67%
- % Wins that the car should have won: 83%
Mercedes
2014
For Mercedes, the three years where the team truly dominated was in 2014, 2015, and 2016. In 2014 the team lost three races in Canada, Spa, and Hungary. Not one of the three races was lost due to the car not being good enough to win.
The race in Canada was lost due to a reliability issue, the race in Spa was lost due to a collision between Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg, and the third race in Hungary was lost because Daniel Ricciardo made the most of the conditions while Rosberg couldn't.
In terms of percentages, the key statistics are:
- Wins: 84%
- Poles: 95%
- % Wins that the car should have won: 100%
2015
In 2015, Mercedes lost three races again and this time around there were two races in Sepang and Hungary where either team error in strategy or driver error cost them, while the race in Singapore saw Sebastian Vettel dominating in his Ferrari.
In terms of percentages, the key statistics are:
- Wins: 84%
- Poles: 95%
- % Wins that the car should have won: 95%
2016
In 2016, Mercedes lost all but two races in Barcelona and Malaysia. In Barcelona, the race was lost due to a collision between Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton while the race in Malaysia was compromised by a reliability issue.
In terms of percentages, the key statistics are:
- Wins: 90%
- Poles: 95%
- % Wins that the car should have won: 100%
Red Bull
Now when we come to Red Bull, the only season that comes close to the kind of dominance that Mercedes and Ferrari had is the 2023 F1 season.
Even the dominant seasons of 2011 and 2013 had competition for Sebastian Vettel from McLaren drivers Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button who won multiple races while Fernando Alonso also continued to be a factor.
Talking about Red Bull's 2023 F1 season, the key statistics are:
- Wins: 95%
- Poles: 64%
- % Wins that the car should have won: 95%
Conclusion
Once we go through these numbers it is astounding to see how dominant these eras have been in the 21st century. Having said that, when we're assigning the term 'most dominant' to any car, should we look at the results it achieved or should we look at the potential of the results that were on the table?
When we talk about Ferrari, the maximum number of races that it could win in a season was 88 percent and the highest pole positions secured were only 67 percent. On the other hand, Red Bull this season had the car to potentially win 95 percent of the races and secured pole position in 64 percent of the races.
You compare this with the all-conquering Mercedes that had the potential of winning 100 percent of the races in 2014 and 2016 and had pole position in 95 percent of the races and you see that the German squad produced the best all-rounded car in the 21st century.
The cars produced by Mercedes were not only a level above in qualifying but also in races as well. While it never achieved the 95 percent success that Red Bull has done this season, it's not down to the car but the drivers colliding or having a bad race.
Hence, if we are going to talk about the most dominant car in the modern history of F1, it's not Red Bull's RB19, it is arguably the Mercedes fielded by the German squad in 2014 and 2016.
