Parc Ferme: Formula 1’s 2025 best & worst performers-Part 1

Parc Ferme takes a broader look at who made it happen and who asked: “What happened?” throughout the F1’s 2025 roller coaster season as we bid farewell to it and get ready for the 2026 campaign with its sweeping new regulations.

This is a no-brainer, of course, Max Verstappen. It’s often challenging to definitively define driver talent in the smoke-and-mirrors world of F1.

However, we have to thank Liam Lawson and Yuki Tsunoda for bringing clarity to an often-obfuscated question. The qualifying and race delta between these two and the four-time F1 World Champion has left us in no doubt.

Max’s ability can turn a midfield car into a race winner. Then, overcoming the points deficit halfway through the season to come within a hairsbreadth of winning the championship.

Simply Herculean. Were we not entertained on the way, too?

If we’re using qualification and race delta between teammates to rate performance, then the optics for Lance Stroll are not a good look, especially when the yardstick is the Autumn of his career.

Since his seat is the safest in F1 history, we cannot ascribe his race results to pressure. Additionally, after x years in F1, stage fright or experience is also not an explanation.

We’ll, ahem, settle on unlucky in qualifying twenty-three times out of twenty-four in 2025.

Competition is tight here. Jonathan Wheatley weaved his magic with Kick Sauber to drag 2025’s expected wooden spoon recipient of the bottom of the table, arguably, with some help from the team that eventually achieved this unsought accolade.

The reverend James Vowles also shone. Together with Carlos Sainz’s help, he turned Williams into a top-5 team.

However, Parc Ferme is nominating Laurent Mekies to take the honours here. Scooped up from the relatively safe and relaxed environment of Racing Bulls, Mekies was parachuted into a team full of wolves that was busy devouring itself from the inside.

The sheep-like Frenchman bore none of the trademarks that would suggest he could pull Red Bull Racing out of its self-imposed tailspin.

Not only did he do this quickly, but he also got the engines going again and rapidly gained enough altitude to enable Max’s second tilt at the Driver’s Championship. As a coup de grâce, he also rid himself and the team of an Austrian “fixed asset” and became the effective CEO. You know, the job Christian really wanted. Chapeau, Laurent!

Bit of a misnomer here, as the winner, or loser if you will, is not a Team Principal.

After an enforced sabbatical, Flavio Briatore returned to a more public role in F1 in 2025 as an adviser to the Alpine team.

The premature and sudden exit stage left by incumbent Team Principal Oliver Oakes meant that Briatore ostensively took on the role in his place, although his title would be Team Chief.

What then ensued has left a question mark over Flavio’s earlier F1 achievements. Replacing Jack Doohan with Franco Colapinto was a blatant money grab.

However, one must wonder whether the crash damage and loss of Constructors' Championship money have totaled more than what was brought in? All in all, Alpine acted like it was an amateur night throughout the year.

The Alpine chassis had potential; unfortunately, the engine was always sucking in air through its exhaust.

Colapinto capped it all off, consistently ending up either in the hedge or at the very rear of the grid. Next year, Alpine has Mercedes engines, maybe Flavio can rehabilitate his reputation, as far as that's possible.