(Motorsport-Total.com) – Mercedes driver Kimi Antonelli wins ahead of Ferrari driver Lewis Hamilton – so far, the real race result at the 2026 Monaco Grand Prix and the outcome of the reader rating on Motorsport-Total.com match. Then comes the big deviation: Virtually, a Red Bull driver is on the podium in third place, but unlike in reality, it’s not Isack Hadjar, but Max Verstappen.
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The four-time world champion convinced readers, Formula 1 expert Marc Surer, and the editorial team with an overall good performance: With 2.20 rating points, he was the best pursuer of Antonelli (1.10) and Hamilton (1.65) and remained clearly ahead of Hadjar, who only finished sixth in the reader rating with 2.52 rating points – even though Verstappen did not even race after a defect at the start.
The “jury” therefore primarily honored Verstappen’s performance in qualifying: The Dutchman was only 0.043 seconds short of a sensational pole position in Monaco. Surer commented: “Fighting for pole almost deserved a 1!” However, he didn’t give him a 1, but – just like the editorial team – a 2. A slightly lower rating by the readers still resulted in a good final grade for Verstappen.
Why Antonelli missed the “straight” 1
Even for Antonelli, the readers decided – in his case with an average of 1.29 rating points against a “straight” 1. Surer said: “I believe this time we don’t have to discuss the 1.” The editorial team saw it the same way.
Surer also rewarded Hamilton with a 1 because the seven-time world champion had delivered “another impressive weekend.” Readers (1.94) and the editorial team (2) rated Hamilton’s performance somewhat more critically.
Racing Bulls driver Liam Lawson achieved his best result so far in the 2026 reader rating with 2.22 rating points in fourth place – just behind Verstappen, but still ahead of Pierre Gasly (2.50), Hadjar (252), Arvid Lindblad (2.58) and Fernando Alonso (2.67), who scored points in the reader rating for the first time in 2026.
Alonso’s teammate Lance Stroll, on the other hand, received the worst ratings of all drivers: final grade 5.3. Surer pulled out a 6 and said: “He only stood out by cutting the chicane and by crashing.” Readers and the editorial team were a little more lenient.
Monaco: The driver ratings from Marc Surer and the editorial team
In the overall standings, Antonelli is once again the sole leader after his Monaco victory, now ahead of Hamilton. Russell now occupies third place ahead of Verstappen and Gasly. Alonso moved past Nico Hülkenberg in the overall standings with his virtual eighth place in Monaco.
Who really shone in Monaco – and who didn’t?
How the editorial team discussed the driver ratings after the Monaco Grand Prix will be a topic on (new!) Tuesday evening from 8:30 PM in the call-in show “Live bei Scheuren” on the Formel1.de Twitch channel. Host Kevin Scheuren invites users to join him personally via Zoom to chat about the Monaco Grand Prix and Formula 1.
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Click through: This is how Surer rates the 22 drivers!
How Marc Surer rates the other drivers can be read in detail in an extended photo gallery. In this photo gallery, both the Formula 1 expert and the editorial team explain their individual ratings for each of the 22 drivers. So that users can hopefully understand even better from now on how the driver ratings came about.
By the way: Many users wish for more transparency from the editorial team when assigning ratings. That’s why we decided to publish the individual ratings of our editors in a separate table. For the overall editorial rating, which constitutes pillar 3 of the system, the editorial team agrees on a common full rating in a conference.
In this conference, which has become a fixed agenda item for us every Monday morning after Formula 1, things sometimes get heated when different opinions clash. And we collect arguments that speak for or against a better or worse rating.
How we assign our ratings
The idea behind our rating system is to evaluate performances on a weekend, and especially in the race, with grades (1 = Very good, 6 = Insufficient). External influences that drivers cannot control themselves should be excluded. And so that not only the editorial team evaluates subjectively, as is the case with football magazines, we have created a total of three equal pillars with the readers and the expert.
And this is how we calculate:
From the average rating of Motorsport-Total.com users, the rating by expert Marc Surer, and the rating by our editorial team, we determine the average. This average value results in our driver ranking. We only display one decimal place, but for the calculation, we use all decimal places. These partially invisible decimal places determine the order of the ranking of two drivers in the event of a supposed rating tie.
The ratings of the individual editors:
We are often asked how our editorial ratings come about. All editors of our Formula 1 team first submit their individual ratings. In an editorial conference on the morning after the Grand Prix, we then exchange views and agree on common editorial ratings, which usually (but not always) reflect the average of the individual editors’ ratings. When determining the editorial ratings, discussions sometimes get heated. The goal is to agree on common driver ratings with which every editor can concur.
Award for Driver of the Year:
Based on the overall ratings of a race weekend, we award points for the 2026 annual standings. Analogous to the points system in the real Formula 1 World Championship, the winner receives 25 points, the second 18, the third 15 – down to one point for 10th place. There is no bonus point for the fastest lap. After the end of the season, the driver with the most points will be awarded the Motorsport-Total.com Award for Driver of the Year 2026.
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