Undercutters Episode 38 - Predictions Assessment
Hello, everyone. Welcome to a special, one-off Undercutters episode. No sound this time (just as well, I’ve excitingly developed another, hopefully minor, health problem that would’ve made recording it slightly unpleasant) but I did want to look back at my predictions and see just how wrong I got things.
Pre-season I predicted which of each driver pairing would end up the best in their particular team. My predictions were:
Gasly to beat Doohan
Alonso to beat Stroll
Norris to beat Piastri
Leclerc to beat Hamilton
Russell to beat Antonelli
Verstappen to beat Lawson
Tsunoda to beat Hadjar
Sainz to beat Albon
Bearman to beat Ocon
Hulkenberg to beat Bortoleto
Whether to count Verstappen or Tsunoda as wins (they were ahead at the time of the Lawson-Tsunoda switch) is debatable, but I’m inclined not to.
As for the other predictions, I got Sainz wrong. He took longer than I expected to get up to speed with Williams, although once he did then he did score more than Albon.
Otherwise, I got all of these correct. Not too bad, especially pleased with Bearman beating Ocon. The Briton had some rough spots but showed good speed. With consistency he could easily be in a top team in the not too distant future.
Doohan
Bortoleto
Hadjar
Colapinto
Bearman
Lawson
Antonelli
It was rather obvious but my call on Doohan getting shipped out, and thus being last, was correct. However, it was Colapinto who was second worst (also on zero points) with Bortoleto next on 19. Lawson’s 38 points put him in the middle of the pack, but I did get Bearman’s spot of third correct (41 points).
Hadjar got 51 for second best, and way exceeded my expectations (mostly because I didn’t think Racing Bulls would be so good). Antonelli topping the list was not a heroic prediction, but it was correct. He racked up 150 points but going missing in the middle of the season did leave a lot on the table.
Verstappen to retain his title
McLaren to retain their title
Haas to be best of the rest
Biggest team mate gap (points) to be Red Bull
Smallest team mate gaps (percentage = Ferrari, points = Haas)
Most poles for Leclerc
Most wins for Norris
Most DNFs = Hadjar
No podium for those outside the top four
Biggest decline from 2024 = Aston Martin
Biggest improvement from 2024 = Williams
Will sprints alter the title result? No
Intra-season development winner, Ferrari
Intra-season development loser, Aston Martin
22 drivers to compete over the season
Verstappen, as you may’ve noticed, did not win the title again but he was only 2 points off. McLaren won easily, so I got one out of two titles right.
Haas were not the best of the rest. Williams won that, and after their strong start courtesy of Albon never looked at too much risk of losing it.
If we count the Verstappen-Tsunoda gap (421 to 33) this is the biggest points gap by rather a long way. Given they were team mates for 22 races, it might be considered a valid prediction.
The Haas gap between team mates was just 3 points, and this was the tightest battle on the grid, as cunningly predicted by me. In percentage terms it was actually McLaren who were very slightly closer (50.8% for Norris against 51.9% for Bearman). Ferrari were more one-sided than I expected, Leclerc got 60.8%.
Leclerc definitely did not get the most poles, he got a single one. It was actually Verstappen who ended up with most, at 8.
I also got most wins wrong. Norris got 7, equal to Piastri, but, once again, it was Verstappen who topped the list with 8.
Using https://www.bigdataf1.com/season/2025/races, Hadjar only had a couple of DNFs. But several drivers had 5 DNFs, including Alonso, Sainz, Lawson, and Bortoleto.
No podium outside the top 4 teams was a big bucket of wrong, with notable podium finishes for Hulkenberg, Hadjar, and a couple for Sainz as well. Rather glad I got this one wrong.
I had Aston Martin as the biggest decline from 2024 but this was clearly Alpine. The latter team went from 65 points and 6th in the standings to 22 points and 10th in 2025. As for the biggest improvement, Williams went up from 17 points and 9th to 137 points and 5th, so I think that counts as correct (Sauber also did much better, of course).
Verstappen did very well in the sprints but this did not lead to him winning the title.
Aston Martin scored more in the latter half of the season than the first, so clearly were not the worst ‘developer’. Alpine only got 3 points in the second half (19 in the first). As for the best, this has to be Red Bull, who had 172 points at the halfway mark but ended up with 451.
And there were only 21 drivers during the season, so I got my 22 prediction wrong.
Anyway, this is the last of the Undercutters episodes, but I did want to revisit just how bad my predictions were. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, everyone.
Morris
Driver Pairings
Pre-season I predicted which of each driver pairing would end up the best in their particular team. My predictions were:
Gasly to beat Doohan
Alonso to beat Stroll
Norris to beat Piastri
Leclerc to beat Hamilton
Russell to beat Antonelli
Verstappen to beat Lawson
Tsunoda to beat Hadjar
Sainz to beat Albon
Bearman to beat Ocon
Hulkenberg to beat Bortoleto
Whether to count Verstappen or Tsunoda as wins (they were ahead at the time of the Lawson-Tsunoda switch) is debatable, but I’m inclined not to.
As for the other predictions, I got Sainz wrong. He took longer than I expected to get up to speed with Williams, although once he did then he did score more than Albon.
Otherwise, I got all of these correct. Not too bad, especially pleased with Bearman beating Ocon. The Briton had some rough spots but showed good speed. With consistency he could easily be in a top team in the not too distant future.
Ranking the Rookies
I ranked the rookies in what I anticipated their standings order would be, with Doohan last mostly because he’d get replaced (which did happen). My order, bottom to top, was:Doohan
Bortoleto
Hadjar
Colapinto
Bearman
Lawson
Antonelli
It was rather obvious but my call on Doohan getting shipped out, and thus being last, was correct. However, it was Colapinto who was second worst (also on zero points) with Bortoleto next on 19. Lawson’s 38 points put him in the middle of the pack, but I did get Bearman’s spot of third correct (41 points).
Hadjar got 51 for second best, and way exceeded my expectations (mostly because I didn’t think Racing Bulls would be so good). Antonelli topping the list was not a heroic prediction, but it was correct. He racked up 150 points but going missing in the middle of the season did leave a lot on the table.
General Predictions
And, because it seemed I had a lot of time on my hands, I also made some general predictions. These included:Verstappen to retain his title
McLaren to retain their title
Haas to be best of the rest
Biggest team mate gap (points) to be Red Bull
Smallest team mate gaps (percentage = Ferrari, points = Haas)
Most poles for Leclerc
Most wins for Norris
Most DNFs = Hadjar
No podium for those outside the top four
Biggest decline from 2024 = Aston Martin
Biggest improvement from 2024 = Williams
Will sprints alter the title result? No
Intra-season development winner, Ferrari
Intra-season development loser, Aston Martin
22 drivers to compete over the season
Verstappen, as you may’ve noticed, did not win the title again but he was only 2 points off. McLaren won easily, so I got one out of two titles right.
Haas were not the best of the rest. Williams won that, and after their strong start courtesy of Albon never looked at too much risk of losing it.
If we count the Verstappen-Tsunoda gap (421 to 33) this is the biggest points gap by rather a long way. Given they were team mates for 22 races, it might be considered a valid prediction.
The Haas gap between team mates was just 3 points, and this was the tightest battle on the grid, as cunningly predicted by me. In percentage terms it was actually McLaren who were very slightly closer (50.8% for Norris against 51.9% for Bearman). Ferrari were more one-sided than I expected, Leclerc got 60.8%.
Leclerc definitely did not get the most poles, he got a single one. It was actually Verstappen who ended up with most, at 8.
I also got most wins wrong. Norris got 7, equal to Piastri, but, once again, it was Verstappen who topped the list with 8.
Using https://www.bigdataf1.com/season/2025/races, Hadjar only had a couple of DNFs. But several drivers had 5 DNFs, including Alonso, Sainz, Lawson, and Bortoleto.
No podium outside the top 4 teams was a big bucket of wrong, with notable podium finishes for Hulkenberg, Hadjar, and a couple for Sainz as well. Rather glad I got this one wrong.
I had Aston Martin as the biggest decline from 2024 but this was clearly Alpine. The latter team went from 65 points and 6th in the standings to 22 points and 10th in 2025. As for the biggest improvement, Williams went up from 17 points and 9th to 137 points and 5th, so I think that counts as correct (Sauber also did much better, of course).
Verstappen did very well in the sprints but this did not lead to him winning the title.
Aston Martin scored more in the latter half of the season than the first, so clearly were not the worst ‘developer’. Alpine only got 3 points in the second half (19 in the first). As for the best, this has to be Red Bull, who had 172 points at the halfway mark but ended up with 451.
And there were only 21 drivers during the season, so I got my 22 prediction wrong.
Anyway, this is the last of the Undercutters episodes, but I did want to revisit just how bad my predictions were. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, everyone.
Morris
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