Who are the most closely-matched Formula 1 team mates so far in 2018? And who is being dominated by the guy in the other garage?

With the summer break upon us and driver considering their driver options for 2019, it’s time to review who’s performing and who isn’t.

Mercedes: Lewis Hamilton vs Valtteri Bottas

In terms of raw results, Valtteri Bottas is faring about as well alongside team mate Lewis Hamilton as he was at this stage in their first season together, 12 months ago. He’s out-qualified the world champion five times, as he had done at last year’s summer break, and though he hasn’t finished ahead as many times, it bears pointing out fortune has not been on his side.

Whereas this time last year Bottas had chalked up two wins, poor luck in China (Safety Car) and Azerbaijan (debris-related puncture) have arguably cost him two this year. Those potentially account for around half his 81-point deficit to Hamilton.

It’s not hard to see why Mercedes has signed him up for another season, then. The question now is whether he can avoid a repeat of his underwhelming second half of 2017.

AUS BAH CHI AZE SPA MON CAN FRA AUT GBR GER HUN Lewis Hamilton Q R

Ferrari: Sebastian Vettel vs Kimi Raikkonen

Unsurprisingly Sebastian Vettel holds sway at Ferrari. And the overall picture is probably slightly less flattering to his team mate Kimi Raikkonen than first appears.

Raikkonen has always been stronger on Sundays than Saturdays. So while his 10-2 deficit to Vettel in qualifying is poor, the second-worst in the field, it’s hardly a shock. He’s managed four finishes in front of Vettel so far but arguably only two of those – Azerbaijan and France – were wholly on merit.

That said, there have been further signs this year Ferrari is tilting things in Vettel’s favour when it comes to race strategy.

AUS BAH CHI AZE SPA MON CAN FRA AUT GBR GER HUN Sebastian Vettel Q R

Red Bull: Daniel Ricciardo vs Max Verstappen

How far was Daniel Ricciardo’s decision to leave red Bull motivated by a desire to avoid playing second fiddle to Max Verstappen?

In their third year as team mates, Verstappen’s raw performance has again been superb. But a series of early-season incidents limited his points scoring.

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Red Bull have had a lot of unreliability too, which further obscures the picture. But the impression is that while Verstappen is capable of being quicker, the more polished Ricciardo is the one you’d expect to regularly achieve his potential.

AUS BAH CHI AZE SPA MON CAN FRA AUT GBR GER HUN Daniel Ricciardo Q R

Force India: Sergio Perez vs Esteban Ocon

Once his role in Force India’s ongoing administration proceedings had been revealed, Sergio Perez admitted it had been a distraction from his driving. Does that explain why Esteban Ocon has led the way so far or, as the Mercedes junior has indicated, has Ocon raised his game?

What’s not in doubt is how Perez ended up ahead of Ocon in the points at this stage despite lagging behind his team mate on every other metric. Ocon paid dearly for a silly first-lap move on Raikkonen in Baku, while Perez swept to a superb podium for the team, which accounts for exactly half his points total.

AUS BAH CHI AZE SPA MON CAN FRA AUT GBR GER HUN Sergio Perez Q R

Williams: Lance Stroll vs Sergey Sirotkin

The stakes couldn’t be lower at Williams, where financial imperatives mean neither driver is realistically in danger of losing their seats due to a lack of performance.

Rookie Sergey Sirotkin may be the only point-less driver in the field at the summer break but he has the edge over Lance Stroll in the qualifying battle. Stroll, of course, was hammered 17-2 by Felipe Massa in qualifying last year. That begs the question whether the ill-handling FW41 is quite as far off the pace as it appears to be.

AUS BAH CHI AZE SPA MON CAN FRA AUT GBR GER HUN Lance Stroll Q R

Renault: Nico Hulkenberg vs Carlos Sainz Jnr

While Nico Hulkenberg led the way at Renault in the early part of the season, Carlos Sainz Jnr has come back at him since the ‘European season’ began.

The Renault operation is still ramping up and it wasn’t until the French round that Sainz’s full engineering team was assembled around him. This was also the first weekend he qualified and finished in front of Hulkenberg.

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We now know he will lose his seat to Ricciardo at the end of the year. That gives the impression he’s been owned by Hulkenberg and Renault have lost faith in him, but as Sainz was only ever on loan to the team from Red Bull, that would be a harsh assessment of his season so far.

AUS BAH CHI AZE SPA MON CAN FRA AUT GBR GER HUN Nico Hulkenberg Q R

Toro Rosso: Pierre Gasly vs Brendon Hartley

Unreliability and incidents means the Toro Rosso drivers have only taken the chequered flag together in half of the races so far this year. But that includes the Bahrain and Hungarian round, where Pierre Gasly delivered the kind of result Brendon Hartley can only envy at the moment.

Hartley was also blamed for the clash between the pair in China, and the brutal scoreline shows he must raise his game in the second half of the season.

AUS BAH CHI AZE SPA MON CAN FRA AUT GBR GER HUN Pierre Gasly Q R

Haas: Romain Grosjean vs Kevin Magnussen

In the days when everything lines up for him, Romain Grosjean is a formidable racing driver. But there have been far too few of those days this year and the rest of the time Kevin Magnussen, in his second season at the team, has shown him the way.

This has surely killed off Grosjean’s hopes of making it to a front-running team.

AUS BAH CHI AZE SPA MON CAN FRA AUT GBR GER HUN Romain Grosjean Q R

McLaren: Fernando Alonso vs Stoffel Vandoorne

AUS BAH CHI AZE SPA MON CAN FRA AUT GBR GER HUN Fernando Alonso’s destruction of Stoffel Vandoorne in qualifying has been total, and Vandoorne’s record in the races is little better. Granted, the MCL33 is not a car to demonstrate great ability in when it is running well, and Vandoorne endured two weekends (Britain and Germany) with a chassis which the team could see was producing less downforce than Alonso car’s. Go ad-free for just £1 per month >> Find out more and sign up That problem appears to be solved now, but it’s down to Vandoorne to reassert himself. As the team recently observed, it’s time for him to start showing he can beat Alonso. Fernando Alonso Q R

Sauber: Marcus Ericsson vs Charles Leclerc

New star Charles Leclerc took a couple of races to find his feet, and has been blowing the doors off Marcus Ericsson ever since. Yes, other drivers have better qualifying scorelines, but look at the margin Leclerc is beating Ericsson by: almost half a second on average.

Ericsson has experienced on his side, however, as his management of the wet conditions in Hungary showed. Otherwise, this has been about as one-sided as many expected it to be.

AUS BAH CHI AZE SPA MON CAN FRA AUT GBR GER HUN Marcus Ericsson Q R

Over to you

Which driver has impressed you most compared to their team mate so far this year?

Have your say in the comments.

2018 F1 season