Formula 1: Sergey Sirotkin poised to win Best Driver of 2018 poll

Williams Martini Racing’s Sergey Sirotkin is poised to win the Best Driver of 2018 poll conducted by Sky Sports. Yes, you read that right.

Sky Sports recently began a poll for fans to vote on who they believe the best driver of the 2018 Formula 1 season is.

The voting for this poll is set to end in the near future with the season finale, the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, being scheduled to take place this Sunday, November 25, and with the way things are looking right now, the winner of this “Best Driver of 2018” poll is poised to be a surprise winner.

Like, a really, really, really surprise winner.

It’s not Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport’s Lewis Hamilton, who clinched his fifth career Formula 1 championship. It’s not Alfa Romeo Sauber rookie Charles Leclerc, whose impressive season driving for a subpar team resulted in him landing a ride with Scuderia Ferrari for the 2019 season.

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In fact, it’s not any driver who currently sits in the top 19 of the driver standings, and in case you weren’t aware, there are only 20 drivers in Formula 1.

The driver who leads this poll, and by a sizable margin nonetheless, is Williams Martini Racing rookie Sergey Sirotkin. The 23-year-old Russian currently sits in 20th (last) place in the driver standings, and he will likely end up finishing there.

Sirotkin has scored just one point this season, as his lone top 10 finish is his 10th place finish in the Italian Grand Prix, which wasn’t even originally a 10th place finish. Haas’ Romain Grosjean, who originally finished the race in sixth, ended up being disqualified from it, promoting Sirotkin from 11th to 10th and earning him his first career point in Formula 1.

Williams have certainly had the slowest cars in the field this season, but Sirotkin, whose financial backing from SMP Racing is the primary reason why he was able to land a ride with the Grove-based team this season as the replacement for Felipe Massa, hasn’t even been able to outperform teammate Lance Stroll, whose father Lawrence’s wallet is the primary reason why he has a ride in Formula 1.

Sirotkin’s average finish in the season’s first 20 races is 15.55, which is the lowest among all drivers. Stroll, who has racked up six points on two top 10 finishes and sits in 18th place in the driver standings, has recorded an average finish of 14.35.

So why on Earth is Sirotkin, who may very well not be back in Formula 1 next year, currently leading second place Hamilton in the voting (as of 4:00 a.m. ET on Tuesday, November 20) by ~17,000 votes (~55,200 to ~38,200) with no other drivers even having half the number of votes that he has??

Two words — and no, they aren’t “Russian collusion”.

Facebook groups.

I am personally in two heavily populated humor-based Formula 1 Facebook groups, and the members of these groups have united to vote for Sirotkin at all costs simply for the comical aspect of it.

It’s actually quite amazing that all of the fans in these groups have been able to come together and pull this off, especially in an age where social media can be so divisive. But at the same time, it will be quite a head-scratcher for Formula 1 fans who don’t engage in Facebook groups when they find out that Sirotkin was voted as the best driver of 2018.

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You can vote on who you believe the best driver is in Formula 1 this season by clicking here, but if you’re not voting for Sergey Sirotkin, it may not be worth it, unless, of course, an additional several thousand uncounted ballots for Lewis Hamilton or some other driver toward the top of the poll are found in Broward County, Florida.

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