Race start, Yas Marina, 2022

Rate the race: 2022 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix

2022 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix

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What did you think of today’s race? Share your verdict on the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.

RaceFans has held polls on every F1 race since 2008 to find out which fans thought of each round of the season.

Join in the latest poll and give your verdict on the race: 10 being the highest and 1 the lowest. Please vote based on how entertaining and exciting you thought the race was, not on how your preferred driver or team performed.

What were the best and worst moments of the race? What was the main thing you’ll remember about it? Rate the race out of ten and leave a comment below:

Rate the 2022 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix out of 10

  • 10 (1%)
  • 9 (2%)
  • 8 (7%)
  • 7 (25%)
  • 6 (27%)
  • 5 (16%)
  • 4 (8%)
  • 3 (7%)
  • 2 (4%)
  • 1 (3%)

Total Voters: 147

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1 = ‘Terrible’, 10 = ‘Perfect’

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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46 comments on “Rate the race: 2022 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix”

  1. gutted for perez, but serves him right helping a crook team/mate. he should learn to be next nico next season.

    1. Wouldn’t have made a difference.
      The race was better than the usual Abu Dhabi GP but the track was not well conceived, no fixing that, hot laps track.
      Drs is not a satisfying way of overtaking for me, following is not totally fixed so coming out of s3 cars lose a lot of time and somehow on some parts there’s not enough room not enough lines to take. Season is a bit over drawn.

    2. Except he cant. Max is the best driver in the history of f1.

      1. Wouldn’t say that yet, but definitely rosberg was far closer to hamilton than perez is to verstappen.

  2. Class act by Leclerc, very well executed race and a deserved 2nd place in the championship.

    Vettel had a great fun first half of the race. Shame he (and the car) couldn’t make the one stop work.

      1. I thought it was leclerc who made the call to stay out…saying he would make the one stop work…..not sure the team strategy quite there yet

        1. His engineer asked him if he can maintain his pace and consider Plan C which was obvious that it meant a one stop strategy.

          1. Yes, but I have to admit I was worried towards the end because leclerc answered to a team radio saying that if he pitted he didn’t think he’d be able to catch perez again, and the engineer answered if they didn’t pit they thought he’d be overtaken on the last lap, and was afraid they’d make him give up without trying, but this time they listened to him eventually.

  3. BLS (@brightlampshade)
    20th November 2022, 14:40

    Bad… I rate it as bad.

    1. My only hope is that somebody finds a passage in the Muslim law that forbid autoracing, at least in Abu Dhabi.
      The track boring and the environment, thought shiny and somewhat nice, is lifeless.

      1. BLS (@brightlampshade)
        20th November 2022, 15:38

        I must admit I am a little jealous of the enthusiasm of those voting this rate 7+
        Wish I could have gotten that much enjoyment out of that 90 minutes of, well something approximating a race.

        1. @brightlampshade Wholeheartedly agree.

          I do wonder if we are all ‘rating’ the same thing? For example, I look at this as an assessment of the number and quality of battles, the execution of strategy, the demonstrable commitment of drivers trying their best to progress, and to a lesser extent, the occurrence of some random factors that spice things up (safety cars, weather etc).

          On the other hand I would not rate a dull race highly merely because my favourite three drivers all filled the podium spaces.

          I can’t help feel that some are rating the result, or the performance of their preferred driver. But, I suppose if that’s what makes the race good for them, It is difficult to argue.

          Another thought is the ‘scale’ used. Whilst it is clearly marked as ranging from ‘terrible’ to ‘perfect’ there is still much subjectivity. I would personally struggle to rate any race a 10, making 9 the highest realistic rating I’d be likely to consider. Yet at least a couple of people have considered this a ‘near perfect’ race.

          1. I’m one of those who voted 7, but I did that because we had some interesting racing going on, you know with the 2 almost consecutive straights that allow passes and some people coming back at the 2nd, including towards the front a few times; obviously there was no challenging verstappen but we had a 2nd place battle and several in the midfield, that’s where the 7 comes from and I have to say that for me to give a race 7 it must be one of the worst of the year, but at least something happened. I notice that 6 and 7 are the most voted options, over half the voters went for either of the 2, while 9% of people (should be around 13 since 145 voters) went higher and then we have a good 40% who rated this insufficient, that’s a lot.

  4. Solid 3. Verstappen taking the idea of ‘team player’ to a whole new level. No problems with him driving off and taking a win, that’s what the drivers are there for and he made his point: he’s way better than Perez. However, the issue for Red Bull (not that anyone else really cares) was precisely that he could have handed those points to Perez last race when it was basically irrelevant to him.

    1. Not true. If VER did the right thing last race, it would have been worth two points. Today, LEC got three points over PER.

      1. @cswilly Fair point, my bad (calculation).

        1. @david-br
          Actually you made a very good point. Verstappen who wasn’t in a position to challenge for the win in Brazil screwed up what was a harmonious team dynamic for nothing. I mean he could have gave the position to Perez in Brazil and still win in Abu Dhabi and have a solid teammate that will help him when needed in the future.

          RBR have in fact secured Ricciardo as a 3rd driver next year to remind Perez they are not short of drivers if he decides to go rogue. Though as we know, September is the month when the contracts normally expires in F1 , with some exceptions, and if next year RBR will be in a tight title fight he can play the card of helping Max and get his contract extended.

          If RBR will decide to drop him then he can do something similar to what Gasly has done with him today in his last race at Alpha Tauri. Normally the Alpha Tauri drivers jump out of the way whenever they see a Red Bull(except for Alguersuari). Today Gasly in his final race for the team, couldn’t care less and he refused to let Perez by and impeded him from being in Leclerc’s DRS in the last lap.

          1. Yes, I like gasly for that cause it’s unfair that red bull actually runs 4 cars.

    2. I found it amusing how much Verstappen tried to sound like a team-player this weekend.

      1. Quite the difference, not a natural thing for him at all it seems. I wonder if he had to have professional coaching?

      2. It’s the one crack in his campaign, and he – and his team – will know the less than impartial press corps will pounce on anything to create drama and have a go at Verstappen in particular. Playing the part is the best way to smooth things over and avoid giving them more material to work with.

        Pérez needing help is the real story here: how was he not way ahead of Leclerc in the RB18?

      3. I found it amusing how much Verstappen tried to sound like a team-player this weekend.

        I actually found it slightly embarrassing. He’d have been better off saying nothing in my view, and for me his comments had – if anything – the opposite effect to that intended.

        1. For a few sec I understood horner (or the engineer, forgot) told him, instead of “1.3 off leclerc” “1 point off”, to make him feel guilty about interlagos and gauge the reaction, then I realised!

  5. Average, typical for Yas Marina Circuit, even after last season’s changes.

    1. Yeah, I do think there were slightly more interesting bits as we get on average at this track @jerejj, but it keeps showing why it’s a bit of a let-down to have this to close out the season when we could have it at a great track like Interlagos instead.

      1. @bascb I’ve never minded about seasons ending at Yas Marina Circuit & to be honest, the setting is suitable for this purpose, but a good point still.

  6. Dutchguy (@justarandomdutchguy)
    20th November 2022, 14:46

    Pretty decent for Abu dhabi, so it gets a 5.

  7. A poor race on an awful circuit.

    For as much as I dislike Jeddah & Miami, Abu Dhabi is by far my least favourite circuit & I still think it’s a horrible place to end the season as even on occasions where a championship is on the line it still always feels a bit flat because there’s no atmosphere around the track as we used to get when the season ended at Interlagos, Suzuka or Adelaide.

    1. Well said, there were times I had some hope of a decent race (behind Verstappen, in true 2022 2nd half season of course) @stefmeister, but it really wasn’t great, and won’t ever be a great race here that I can see.

    2. I do think the atmosphere at least on the main straight was helped a bit by what looked like the Mexican football fans that hopped over to the ME deciding to go watch this race as well (going on the huge cheers for Perez and whistles of dislike when Max was talking) @stefmeister, @bosyber.

      Apart from that, this track continues to be the most expensive letdown it has been the last decade really. And not even it being flat can really be an excuse anymore – CotA showed you can build on a swamp-mud plain and still build a decent amount of elevation – instead the money went to a glitzy overpriced hotel and gaudy “marine”.

  8. 7. Lots of good overtakes and racing and some tension for the podium but overall nothing memorable.

  9. Yes, maybe this wasn’t the most exciting race in this season but compare to Emilia-Romagna GP, Monaco GP, Azerbaijan GP, Belgian GP, Mexican GP, at least it had some interesting battle, some strategic tricks, battle for 2nd place Ferraris were suprisingly fast and a little drama in Mercedes. 5 or 6

  10. Deserved 2nd in the WDC for Leclerc. While Max dominated the race Ferrari gambled on the 1 stop to get past Perez and Charles made it work. Probably not a populair opinion here but I had to laugh when Sainz pulled the same move on Hamilton like Max did last year. Probably the stewards in panic mode but this year made the right call

    1. Ahh, makes sense, they didn’t want to interfere in the title fight last year, and for example didn’t penalise that strange force-off-track move in brazil, so goes for abu dhabi too, this time instead there was nothing to fight for, easy penalty.

  11. Felt generous and gave it a 6/10. Surprisingly good for this track: decent action in the mid-pack, a good split in strategy to shake things up.

    While the season did not go out with a bang, it did not go out with a whimper either. Just a “meh”, I suppose.

  12. I think we should prepare for a 3x WDC Verstappen.
    Unless Mercedes lands a better car in 2023, there will be no competition.
    Inside RB, Perez is not in contention. Not because of team orders, but he simply can drive this car fast. It seems the best he can do is to perform as poorly as SAI, who it ialso nocompetition to LEC.
    And even today, Ferrari almost ruined LEC race again. A less cooperative SAI would have make LEC lose a lot of time after LEC pitstop.
    So, we either have a competitive MERC with which a motivated HAM and a disciplined RUS can fight for wins, or RB will give VER a car as fast and reliable as anything the other teams can offer. And VER can oversociopath the other sociopaths in pure driving skills.

  13. Pretty good for Abu Dhabi.
    Heroic performance from Gasly.

  14. Undoubtedly a good race for the standards at this track.
    A generous 7/10.

  15. 3. Barely watchable. Max was untouchable, and with a few more laps there could have been a battle for P2, but there wasn`t. A few scattered midfield battles, not much else. And the track is just plain awful.

  16. Keith C (not that one)
    20th November 2022, 23:05

    The first time ever, in the middle of the race I thought “how does this rate?”. And I thought that, despite a few pitstop strategy battles and Crofty’s best, futile efforts to inject some excitement, it looks like a 4.

    This may be my first race rating and usually I’m mentally rating them higher than most folks do. But not this time.

    1. Ahah, you should give a look to abu dhabi 2018 I think it was, there was a race around those years where it was a full procession, nothing happened at all, they ended in the starting positions, I gave it 4 and I’m one of those who gave 7 this time as we had a few battles!

  17. It’s worth 4, at most.

  18. It is odd isn’t it. I really quite enjoyed this race when it seems most people did not. I generously gave it 8. Maybe it’s to do with the presentation on C4 in the U.K.?

    I saw some good racing, not at the very front but in the midfield certainly. And some interesting strategy decisions. There were a few mistakes as well to spice things up.

    The last race in Brazil, which is a circuit I love, people were giving 8s and 9s to. I could not see my way to giving it more than 7 though. I thought it was a little boring for Brazil.

    So my 8 is nothing to do with favouring a particular driver. It does just show how subjective this measurement is though.

    1. Perhaps if you’re on a track that normally produces good racing like brazil you tend to be harsher and viceversa in abu dhabi or monaco.

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