Formula 1: Is Max Verstappen better than Lewis Hamilton?

Amid rumors that Max Verstappen may join Mercedes for the 2020 Formula 1 season, the Lewis Hamilton vs. Max Verstappen debate for Formula 1 supremacy has been on in full-force. Is Verstappen better than Hamilton?

Over the last few months, Aston Martin Red Bull Racing’s Max Verstappen has been rumored to join Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport as the new teammate to Lewis Hamilton for the 2020 Formula 1 season after Red Bull Racing team manager Helmut Marko discussed a performance clause in Verstappen’s contract.

Marko stated that if Red Bull Racing do not give the 21-year-old a car that is capable of winning the championship in their first season using Honda engines after terminating their partnership with Renault, a performance clause in his contract, which is a three-year contract extension that he signed in October of 2017, would allow him to leave the team after the 2019 season.

These rumors really heated up when Marko expressed further concern over the Milton Keynes-based team retaining Verstappen for the 2020 season and Max’s father Jos, a former Formula 1 driver himself, retweeted the article in which Marko’s statement appeared.

Now Raymond Vermeulen, Max’s manager, has confirmed that such a performance clause exists within his contract, but he declined to reveal any specific details about it.

More from Formula One

• Formula 1: Top Red Bull threat identified for 2024
• Formula 1: Why the Max Verstappen retirement obsession?
• Formula 1: Williams ‘mistake’ hints Logan Sargeant’s future
• Formula 1 awaiting key confirmation for 2024 season
• Formula 1: The ‘championship’ Max Verstappen only leads by 3 points

If Verstappen does end up replacing Valtteri Bottas, whose contract with the Silver Arrows expires at the end of the season if the team do not pick up the additional one-year option that it carries, ahead of the 2020 season, it could set up a teammate battle for the ages between him and the five-time and two-time reigning champion.

Verstappen is widely considered the most talented driver in the field, and justifiably so given what he has demonstrated over the past few seasons at such a young age. But is he really better than Hamilton?

There are a few aspects of this debate to consider to the point where I will tell you right now that there is no clear answer, at least from what we currently have to base the debate on.

Based on competition and results alone, it is impossible to say for sure which of these two drivers is better.

Verstappen has never driven for a team that have finished higher than third place in the constructor standings while only twice has Hamilton driven for a team that finished outside of the top two (McLaren finished in third in the 2009 season and again in the 2012 season).

Verstappen had secured the first five victories of his career at an age (21 years and 28 days) when no other driver in Formula 1 history had even won his first race, but Hamilton did not make his Formula 1 debut until he was 22 years and 70 days old.

Based on results alone, it is an apples to oranges comparison.

But let’s look at a few important additional aspects.

First of all, if you had to pick a driver to start a team right now, there’s no doubt that Verstappen is the logical selection. The fact that he is even in this debate makes him the easy selection when you consider the fact that he is 21 years old and Hamilton is 34. If this article was about which driver has more potential, one word would be required in the whole body: Verstappen.

However, it would be easy to pick Hamilton overall for one simple reason: he is far more proven. He has competed in Formula 1 in each of the last 13 seasons whereas Verstappen is in his fifth, and he has won 79 races, which ranks second on the all-time wins list. Verstappen recently secured his sixth career victory. Additionally, Hamilton’s championship total of five is tied for second on the all-time championships list.

Hamilton has already solidified himself as at least a top five driver of all-time, and he is poised to add to his case with several more victories and another championship this year. Verstappen could end up as the greatest and collect every single significant record in the book, or he could end up outside of the top 50.

That’s just the nature of a “who’s better?” debate between the man carrying the torch and the man poised to carry it into the next era of any sport, including Formula 1 — there is no clear answer.

Another reason to pick Hamilton would be Verstappen’s reputation as a reckless driver. He didn’t earn the nicknames “Crashstappen” or “Vercrashen” for no reason.

But look at the last year. When is his last outcome-altering wreck? Sure, he wrecked in practice for the Austrian Grand Prix not even two weeks ago, but he then won that race after an epic comeback drive from more than 15 seconds behind race leader Charles Leclerc of Scuderia Ferrari following a terrible start.

You have to go back to last year’s Monaco Grand Prix for his last significant wreck. He wrecked in the third and final practice session for this race, which prevented him from qualifying on a weekend during which Red Bull Racing’s speed was on another level.

At worst, he would have won this race after starting in second place, as the engine of teammate Daniel Ricciardo experienced an issue for the 78-lap race’s final 60 laps that left him going roughly 20 miles per hour slower than his rivals on the straightaways. Ricciardo still finished the race 7.336 seconds ahead of Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel in second.

Instead, he finished in ninth place after carving his way through the field following a 20th (last) place start. Since this race, a total of 24 races have been contested, and Verstappen has finished all but two of them. He was forced to retire from last year’s British Grand Prix with a gearbox issue, and he was forced to retire from last year’s Hungarian Grand Prix after losing power.

Excluding these two races, he is on a 22-race streak of top five finishes that includes 13 podium finishes, including five in a row at one point, and two victories. His average finishing position is 3.09 during this 22-race span.

“Crashstappen”/”Vercrashen” seems to be a thing of the past.

With all of this information laid out and tons more out there on which to base who you believe is the better of these two drivers, it is impossible to fault either answer to this question.

But if I had to answer the question that the article poses, I would have to say that Verstappen is better, and I would point to the recent success argument as the key factor in this answer.

In Hamilton’s last 17 victories going back to the start of the 2018 season, he has made one actual winning pass over a non-disabled car (including only passes for the lead but excluding lap one, turn one passes, passes because of confirmed team orders, passes in the pits and passes of leaders with mechanical issues). He passed Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen to win the 2018 Italian Grand Prix.

Yes, he has taken a number of pole positions — after all, he is the all-time pole position recordholder by a whopping 18 pole positions over second place with 86 — since the start of the 2018 season as well, 14 to be exact, but he has only taken nine pole positions in these 17 races. Several of these 17 victories went to him simply because he was in the right place at the right time.

In Verstappen’s first six victories, he has already made two actual winning passes, including one over Hamilton in the 2017 Malaysian Grand Prix and one over Leclerc to win the Austrian Grand Prix last month. He did not start from the pole position en route to securing any of these six victories.

This figure points to Hamilton as being more opportunistic as of late as opposed to dominant, albeit several of his wins coming in dominant fashion. Another figure that points to this idea is the fact that the number of points that Vettel threw away and Hamilton gained as a result of Vettel’s unforced errors last season totals between 90 and 93. The opportunistic Hamilton only won last year’s championship over the Ferrari driver by 88 points.

Is Lewis Hamilton the best active driver in Formula 1, or has the torch already been passed to rising superstar Max Verstappen? If the two drivers end up as teammates at Mercedes in the 2020 season, who will prevail as the superior driver and likely the 2020 champion? Hopefully we get the chance to find out.