Lance Stroll has gone up in opposition to some powerful crew mates in his System 1 profession. One a number of champion changed one other alongside him at Aston Martin final yr.
His father Lawrence Stroll clearly has the best attainable ambitions for the crew he owns. For junior to play his position in that, he must not less than display enchancment alongside drivers who’re rather more skilled than him and have been way more profitable than most.
That hasn’t all the time occurred. In 2022, his second yr alongside Sebastian Vettel, Stroll’s share of the crew’s factors rating fell in comparison with the earlier season. And his problem solely obtained more durable when Vettel’s alternative arrived.
The competition between the 2 Aston Martin drivers in 2023 was one of the crucial one-sided on the grid. Fernando Alonso reached the rostrum eight occasions, Stroll not as soon as.
Even permitting for the damage Stroll carried into the beginning of final season, his type alongside Alonso was poor. He adopted his crew mate house 14 occasions within the 16 races the place each completed, and was thumped 19-3 in qualifying. Stroll scored simply 26% of the crew’s factors: Alonso out-scored him by virtually an element of three.
For his or her second yr alongside one another, and Stroll’s sixth season at his father’s crew, each drivers had to deal with a automobile which was far much less aggressive than they loved the yr earlier than. Podiums have been not a critical prospect and by the top of the season reaching the factors had turn into an achievement
Regardless of that, this was a barely higher season for the crew’s junior driver. He even led Alonso within the qualifying battle at one stage, going 4-3 up in Monaco, however solely out-qualified his crew mate as soon as extra over the remaining 15 rounds.
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Stroll additionally completed forward of Alonso extra typically than final yr. A kind of events got here in Australia, the place Alonso took the chequered flag earlier than his crew mate, solely to fall behind because of his penalty for an unorthodox piece of defensive driving whereas being pursued by George Russell.
Regardless of that, there was one key metric the place Stroll didn’t present an enchancment in comparison with final yr, and it was the underside line: His contribution to the crew’s factors complete. From that 26% final yr it slipped to 24%. It’s no coincidence that on the time of writing Stroll is within the longest point-less streak of his complete profession.
Final yr Aston Martin’s failure to beat McLaren to fourth place within the constructors’ championship may moderately be blamed on Stroll’s failure to get as a lot out of their automobile as Alonso did. The identical can’t be mentioned this yr: The AMR24 was by no means realistically going to complete larger than fifth within the championship.
Nonetheless, given how slender McLaren’s profitable margin over Ferrari was this yr, Aston Martin ought to ask themselves whether or not their present driver line-up would have delivered a constructors’ title had they constructed an MCL38.
Stroll vs Alonso in 2024
General scores
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Head-to-head
Qualifying efficiency
Unrepresentative comparisons omitted. Detrimental worth: Stroll was quicker; Constructive worth: Alonso was quicker
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