Red Bull's season of near-total control

At the very front, 2023 rarely left much room for suspense. Max Verstappen won 19 races, took his third consecutive World Championship, and helped Red Bull Racing win all but one Grand Prix.

The interest was in everything happening behind him. Fernando Alonso put Aston Martin on the podium from the opening race, McLaren went from the back of the midfield to fighting near the front, and Carlos Sainz produced the one weekend Red Bull could not control.

Race Calendar

The calendar was meant to contain 23 rounds, but severe flooding in Emilia-Romagna forced the cancellation of the Imola race. That left 22 completed Grands Prix.

Las Vegas joined the schedule as a Saturday-night race, while the Sprint format expanded to six weekends: Azerbaijan, Austria, Belgium, Qatar, the United States, and São Paulo.

Drivers and Constructors

Red Bull, Ferrari, and Mercedes kept the same pairings, but several of the moves behind them shaped the season.

• Red Bull, Ferrari, and Mercedes all retained their 2022 pairings.
• Fernando Alonso left Alpine to join Aston Martin, replacing the retiring Sebastian Vettel.
• Pierre Gasly moved to Alpine, forming an all-French line-up with Esteban Ocon.
• Oscar Piastri made his Formula 1 debut with McLaren, replacing Daniel Ricciardo.
• Nyck de Vries took a full-time seat at AlphaTauri, while Logan Sargeant joined Williams as a rookie.
• Nico Hulkenberg returned to a full-time Formula 1 seat with Haas.

AlphaTauri also changed drivers during the year. Daniel Ricciardo replaced Nyck de Vries from Hungary, then Liam Lawson stepped in when Ricciardo broke his hand and scored points in Singapore.

2023 Season Analysis

The winners’ table is almost entirely blue. Verstappen won 19 of the 22 races, while Sergio Pérez added victories in Saudi Arabia and Azerbaijan. Red Bull’s only defeat came in Singapore, where Sainz controlled the pace and used Lando Norris behind him to keep the faster Mercedes cars out of DRS range.

Behind Red Bull, the order changed several times:

• Alonso took six podiums in the opening eight races and made Aston Martin the early surprise.
• McLaren’s Austria upgrade changed its season. Norris became a regular podium threat and Oscar Piastri won the Qatar Sprint in his rookie year.
• Ferrari remained inconsistent, but Sainz’s Singapore drive prevented a clean Red Bull sweep.
• Mercedes won no races, yet its steadier points haul was enough to beat Ferrari to second in the Constructors’ Championship.

Points, Podiums, Sprints and DNFs

Verstappen missed the podium only once all year. His 21 podiums were more than twice Pérez’s nine; Alonso had eight and Norris seven. The numbers also show how quickly McLaren caught Aston Martin after its slow start.

Verstappen scored in the top ten at all 22 races. Hamilton managed 20 points finishes, while Pérez and Alonso recorded 19 each. At the other end of the field, Williams scored only eight times between its two drivers, but Albon’s seven results were enough to secure seventh for the team.

The Sprint standings were just as one-sided at the top: Verstappen scored 45 points, 20 more than Pérez. Piastri’s win in Qatar was the exception and his first Formula 1 victory of any kind.

Verstappen set the fastest lap nine times. Hamilton was next with four, while Pérez and Piastri had two each.

Esteban Ocon and Logan Sargeant had the most retirements with seven each. Verstappen, Hamilton, and Norris retired only once, another reason their points totals stayed so consistent across the season.

Point Progression

Pérez was still only six points behind Verstappen after winning in Azerbaijan. He did not win again. Verstappen took the next seven races, then extended that run to a record ten consecutive victories at Monza. The title was mathematically his during the Qatar Sprint, with six Grands Prix still to run.

Red Bull led the Constructors’ Championship throughout and finished with 860 points, more than twice Mercedes’ total. The closer fight was for second: Mercedes beat Ferrari by only three points. McLaren’s steep rise after Austria carried it past Aston Martin for fourth.

Conclusions and Final Standings

Verstappen ended the season with 575 points, 290 more than Pérez, and Red Bull won 21 of the 22 completed Grands Prix. It was an extraordinary level of control.

The rest of the grid still moved forward. Alonso gave Aston Martin its strongest season, McLaren found a competitive car halfway through the year, and Piastri immediately looked at home in Formula 1. Sainz’s Singapore victory remains the race that stopped Red Bull from completing a perfect sweep.

Note: Results were checked against the official Formula 1 classifications. The charts were generated from the Jolpica F1 API, the maintained successor to Ergast.