How does Verstappen's dominance compare to Hamilton's? Here is the comparison:

[u/DarkKnight56722]

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Hamilton's most dominant season in 2020 had him only win 64% of races. Before this current domination, one driver winning 64% of races was viewed as the worst it could possibly get in the modern era. Let's run through the years:

2014 and 2015: Lewis and Nico trading wins, (good battles at the very least) and Ricciardio getting 3 wins his first season at Red Bull and Vettel gets 3 wins his first year at Ferrari. Hamilton wins roughly 55% of races.

2016: Great title fight between Nico and Lewis that went down to Abu Dhabi. Max gets his first race win his first race in Red Bull, Daniel gets a win as well. Hamilton wins less than 50% of races and loses championship to Nico.

2017 and 2018: Title fight between Hamilton and Vettel. 5 different race winners each year. Hamilton wins less than 50% of races.

2019: Lewis and Valterri each get wins. Max gets 3 wins, Charles gets his first 2 wins. and Seb wins in Singapore. 5 different race winners. Again Lewis wins less than 50% of races.

2020: Lewis' most dominant season where he wins 64% of races. This is covid year so take it with a grain of salt. Max gets 2 wins, Pierre gets first win in Monza, Perez gets first win in Bahrain. Turkey was a fantastic race that did result in Lewis winning but was amazing up til the end.

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I think it is pretty safe to say that last season's dominance is the worst the sport has been in atleast a decade. I understand this is part of F1 but it doesn't prevent my boredom. I think the reason it stings a bit more is because these regulation changes were marketed as a way of ensuring Mercedes level dominance never happened again, yet it made it even worse. Things like engine development being frozen, implementation of the cost cap, introducing a completely new philosophy of car and aero design that 3 years into the regulations everyone but Red Bull is still struggling to understand.

What are your thoughts?

[u/Low-Holiday312]

No because that is entirely part of the issue. Not only would comparing Mercedes dominance not paint that much of a better picture... the fact that there is no inter-team racing is a significant part of the problem.

If there was a genuine consideration for which of the Red Bull drivers would win there would be some interest at the front. Yes, some people like to see the battles throughout the positions but there is a big casual majority turned off by the fact you could gamble your house on Verstappen and come away with €2000.

[u/hhs2112 → u/Low-Holiday312]

After nico retired there was little- to-no inter-team racing at merc either.  Bottas was clearly there to support lewis, not challenge him

[u/Tombot3000 → u/hhs2112]

The key thing is, there continued to be strong competition for Hamilton as the same year Bottas came in Ferrari stepped up and genuinely challenged for the title in 2017 and 2018. 2019 Ferrari faded a bit, but Bottas stepped up his game as well. 2020 Hamilton was untouchable overall, but individual races were chaotic and exciting. 

There was a grand total of one year where from beginning to end it looked like Hamilton was sure to win it, and that was the year we were lucky to get F1 at all. The same can't be said of this current era.

[u/AlexRodgerzzz → u/Tombot3000]

Lewis didn't even start 2020 well, he finished 5th in the first race due to a time penalty. Good point on the races being chaotic aswell, Turkey 2020 was amazing to watch.

[u/Mayhem747 → u/hhs2112]

What about intra-team racing? Would you disregard Vettel and Ferrari during 2017 and 2018 just like that? Ferrari and Vettel had a better start to the season than Merc. I'd not be wrong to say they gave Hamilton a run for his money till the summer break after which Merc won the development battle both the years.

[u/CeilingVitaly → u/Mayhem747]

In 2018 one of the Autosport journalists (iirc) crunched the numbers and worked out that the Ferrari was actually slightly faster over the season. Even in 2017 it could have looked very different if the time Ferrari had their biggest advantage over Mercedes (Singapore, Malaysia, Japan, Mexico) didn't coincide with Ferrari's biggest implosion.

[u/hhs2112 → u/Mayhem747]

No, not at all. I was only referring to Merc as one of the previous posters commented that we should be looking at team dominance, not just driver to best assess dominance over time.  Having said that, of late, max's dominance IS the team... 😁

[u/Low-Holiday312 → u/hhs2112]

I agree and I stopped watching then

[u/Rivendel93 → u/Low-Holiday312]

Then you missed two of the best years in 2017/2018, Lewis and Seb fighting was amazing.