Ranked: Top 5 best F1 wet weather drives of the 2025 season (so far)

Often in F1, it is said that the wet weather does end up as a great equalizer for everyone. While there is truth to that, we've seen this season that the performance levels in the wet, as well, can vary depending on the car.

At the same time, there are still certain challenges involved when we talk about a wet race. The conditions can be quite tough to navigate, there's the unpredictability factor, and the grid can also get quite mixed up.

We've had two F1 races where rain has played a major role this season. What are some of the drives that have stood out this year? Let's take a look.

#5 Kimi Antonelli (P4 at the 2025 F1 Australian GP)

A P4 in a Mercedes on debut is not as eye-catching as it should be, but context is important here. The young Italian driver surprised a lot of people on his debut because, for a rookie, such a result wasn't expected. Kimi Antonelli started the race in P16 in treacherous conditions.

In conditions where rookies Jack Doohan, Isack Hadjar, Carlos Sainz, Gabriel Bortoleto, and Liam Lawson crashed out, Kimi Antonelli kept the car on the road and made his way through the field. What was even more astounding was the fact that the later stages of the race saw the youngster being even faster than his teammate George Russell and closing down the gap on him.

On debut, these were the worst conditions that could have been offered to him, and Antonelli passed with flying colors.

#4 Pierre Gasly (P6 at the 2025 F1 British GP)

Pierre Gasly has been one of the unheralded stars of the season, who has brought some impressive results for Alpine at a time when the team is going through a very strange transition. The drive in Silverstone was another such example, where he made the most of the conditions and brought the car home in P6.

In a race where drivers like Charles Leclerc and George Russell made it a point to trip over themselves again and again, Gasly brought home some valuable points for the French team.

#3 Lando Norris (P1 at the 2025 F1 Australian GP)

The word context is probably being used more than once in this article, but it is surely important. Lando Norris was coming into the 2025 F1 season as a title favorite after arguably losing a championship in a car that should have won in 2024. The pressure was already there, and so was a reputation for messing things up from good situations.

The Australian GP was a perfect example of conditions where Lando Norris could have made a mess of things. He could have made a mistake when Verstappen was hounding him. He could have done the same when Piastri was on his tail, and he could have done it in the wet conditions.

Throughout all of this, the Brit absorbed the pressure and made sure he kept things clean and brought the car home ahead of everyone else.

#2 Max Verstappen (P2 at 2025 F1 Australian GP)

If there was ever a race that showed the kind of class that Max Verstappen possesses, it was the race in Melbourne at the start of the season. In all fairness, the Dutch driver had no right to even be in the same postcode as the McLarens of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri in that race. The Red Bull didn't have the tire life of its rivals, but Verstappen's early assault in an attempt to grab the track position was a brilliant display in itself.

The driver was right on Norris' tail until the chequered flag and showed what quality of a talent he is, even in lesser machinery.

#1 Nico Hulkenberg (P3 at 2025 F1 British GP)

You cannot look beyond what Nico Hulkenberg did at Silverstone this season. Not just for the feel-good factor involved with it, but also for the caliber of drive that he put together. He made his way through the entire field in a Sauber to finish on the podium.

And it's not even just a case of the driver getting lucky with a freak strategy, but it's also a case of the driver making the right calls every time, and when push came to shove, he had the pace in reserve to hold off the likes of Lewis Hamilton in his Ferrari.

The British weather does have a tendency to either bring the best or the worst out of drivers, and in the case of Hulkenberg, it brought him his first F1 podium.