Tracking F1 teams’ rate of development and relative performance is a difficult task, but on this page we aim to make things slightly easier. In each of the graphs below, we examine the teams’ gaps to the ‘Ultimate Pace’ at each race and compare that to their 2018 counterparts.
“Formula 1.5”
Before we look at each individual team, we can see the gap between the Ultimate Pace (in all of the last three seasons set by either Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull) and the leader of the rest of the field (more commonly referred to as “Formula 1.5”). The graph below shows the percentage gap between the fourth fastest team’s best theoretical qualifying lap (that being the fourth team’s best three sector times in qualifying added together) and the “Ultimate Pace” (that being the best three sector times set during qualifying added together). The grey line represents the fourth fastest team’s lap time percentage in 2018, while the red line shows the fourth fastest team’s lap time percentage in 2019:
Team By Team:
The first graph for each team below shows the team’s best possible lap time from qualifying (i.e. their best three sector times added together) in both 2018 and 2019 as a percentage of the “Ultimate Pace” (i.e. the best possible lap time from the three fastest sector times through qualifying). Meanwhile, the graph below shows the team’s ranking in terms of best possible lap time at all 21 rounds in both 2018 and 2019, with ‘1’ being the fastest overall team, and ’10’ being the slowest. Each team’s best possible lap time is calculated by adding together the three fastest sector times set by either of their drivers.
Mercedes
Ferrari
Red Bull
Renault
Haas
McLaren
Racing Point
Alfa Romeo
Toro Rosso
Williams
Disclaimer: There are some minor flaws in the method. Firstly, it’s worth noting that both the 2018 Hungarian and Belgian Grands Prix qualifying sessions were held in wet conditions, so times are not necessarily representative for those rounds. There may also be discrepancies in rounds such as the 2018 Russian Grand Prix, in which Red Bull purposefully chose not to set a competitive lap time in Q2 due to engine penalties. Also note that the USA and Mexico rounds were the other way around in 2018, but we’ve reversed them on these graphs to follow comparative progress over the 2019 season.