It is often suggested that while misfortune such as a car failure or a shunt may ruin one race for a driver, over a season of more than 20 rounds that tends to even out. In reality this is seldom the case, and some drivers end up suffering more bad luck than their rivals during a championship.
In typical style, Fernando Alonso openly lamented his misfortune as his second season at Alpine drew to a close late last year. “It’s just amazing that only one or two cars retire at every race and it’s always car 14,” he remarked following one retirement.
As far as his own team goes, Alonso appears to have had a point: Esteban Ocon did not encounter as many problems on the other side of the garage. But what about the rest of the 20-car field? Was anyone else as ill-served by fortune but less vocal about it?
To look back over the 2022 season and find the unluckiest drivers on the grid, it’s important to go beyond just what happens on race day. Problems that arise in practice can have a major knock-on effect for a driver’s weekend, while something going wrong in qualifying could ruin a driver’s chances before the race has even begun.
So to assess how unlucky the field is, RaceFans looked back over all 22 race weekends to see how many times each driver experienced a significant problem in any session that affected them negatively that could reasonably be considered as out of their control. That includes any car problems that limited running, slowed them down or led to retirement.
Furthermore, the tally counted any damage sustained in collisions where the other driver involved was deemed responsible or where they were an innocent third party (racing incidents between two drivers where no further action was taken are not included). Any rounds in which the driver served a power unit penalty of some kind and significantly long pit stops were also included.
Anything where a driver has a reasonable degree of control over what happened, such as hitting the wall or suffering damage as a result of a collision where the driver shared a level of responsibility, is not counted. Further, any situation where a driver lost out due a Safety Car or a poor strategy decision will be considered as just part of the sport.
Our analysis indicates five drivers had the most conspicuously poor fortune during 2022, and at least one can consider himself about as unlucky as Alonso was.
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Kevin Magnussen
Car problems in practice: 4
Car problems in qualifying: 1
Rounds with PU grid penalty: 3
Minor car problems in a race/sprint: 2
Significantly slow pit stops: 0
Retirements from contact: 1
Retirements from car failure: 2
Retirement rate: 22.7%
Kevin Magnussen’s return to Formula 1 was by no means straightforward. He made an impressive return to the sport by scoring multiple points with Haas over the opening rounds, but his luck soon turned.
Among the technical troubles Magnussen encountered with his VF-22 were a series of power unit problems. As ever, these proved a double whammy, compromising both the events in which they struck and subsequent rounds where he had to take grid penalties: France, Italy and Mexico.
Then there is the matter of the highly unusual trio of black-and-orange flags Magnussen encountered over the season, each forcing him into the pits for repairs and badly compromising his races. Should these be considered examples of misfortune?
Arguably not, as each was provoked by contact with another driver which caused the initial damage. But as Haas pointed out other drivers in similar situations were not always called into the pits by the race director, notably Fernando Alonso in Austin.
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Yuki Tsunoda
Car problems in practice: 2
Car problems in qualifying: 1
Rounds with PU grid penalty: 5
Minor car problems in a race/sprint: 1
Significantly slow pit stops: 1
Retirements from contact: 2
Retirements from car failure: 2
Retirement rate: 23.8%
Yuki Tsunoda is no stranger to having his race weekends involving some kind of misfortune or regrettable incident, as he experienced at least one instance of bad luck in over half the rounds in 2022.
Some were his fault, such as his collision with team mate Pierre Gasly at Silverstone, and so have not been counted here. But on other occasions he was simply unfortunate, as in Baku where his DRS failed while he was on course for a good result. He also received grid penalties at five rounds during the year – almost a quarter of the season.
Pierre Gasly
Car problems in practice: 1
Car problems in qualifying: 2
Rounds with PU grid penalty: 3
Minor car problems in a race/sprint: 1
Significantly slow pit stops: 0
Retirements from contact: 2
Retirements from car failure: 1
Retirement rate: 13.6%
Statistically, Pierre Gasly’s season may not have looked all too challenging. However, the second AlphaTauri driver suffered some unique misfortunes over the course of the year.
At the Red Bull Ring, he was denied the opportunity to participate in Q3 in unusual circumstances, due to Sergio Perez being allowed through into the final phase of qualifying despite having set an illegal last time. By the time the stewards deleted Perez’s lap, qualifying was over. Then, in Hungary, Gasly had his own lap time deleted for exceeding track limits, despite it appearing that he had kept within the margins.
Gasly also had the misfortune of hitting an advertising board that was dislodged by Carlos Sainz Jnr at a soaking wet Suzuka circuit. That led to the pit stop and delay which caused his frightening near-miss with a crane the following lap.
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Fernando Alonso
Car problems in practice: 1
Car problems in qualifying: 1
Rounds with PU grid penalty: 3
Minor car problems in a race/sprint: 3
Significantly slow pit stops: 1
Retirements from contact: 0
Retirements from car failure: 5
Retirement rate: 27.3%
Officially, Alonso only retired from four grands prix due to car-related failures in 2022. But that under-reads the scale of the misfortune he suffered. He also pulled his Alpine off the circuit in Mexico after a power unit failure but was classified as a finisher as he’d completed more than 90% of the race distance.
At Imola he dropped out with damaged caused when Mick Schumacher hit him. Then there were the occasions when he was compromised by car problems which did not end his race, as in Canada.
His bad luck wasn’t confined to Sundays, either. In Austria Alonso was unable to even start the sprint race due to an electronic control unit failure. Add to that his poorly-timed hydraulics failure in qualifying for the Australian Grand Prix, while he was threatening to claim a place on the front row, and it’s easy to understand why the two-times world champion was so frustrated with his season.
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Valtteri Bottas
Car problems in practice: 6
Car problems in qualifying: 1
Rounds with PU grid penalty: 3
Minor car problems in a race/sprint: 1
Significantly slow pit stops: 1
Retirements from contact: 1
Retirements from car failure: 4
Retirement rate: 27.3%
With Friday practice lengths having been reduced from 90 minutes to 60 in recent seasons, drivers now enjoy only three hours of track time on standard race weekends to set up their cars for qualifying and the race. But Valtteri Bottas had less track time than everyone in 2022 but to just how frequently he was forced to sit out entire sessions due to car problems.
Although Bottas would likely take poor reliability on Fridays in exchange for his car not letting him down on Sundays, that happened on a few occasions during the year too.
Fortunately for him, as the season went on Alfa Romeo began to improve on their poor reliability. Unfortunately, as they did, the team found themselves caught by their midfield rivals. But in the end, Bottas’s early season success allowed them to cling onto sixth in the constructors’ championship on count-back.
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