Max Verstappen broke Formula 1’s single-season win record with 15 victories in the Red Bull RB18 in 2022, in one of the most dominant years the sport has seen – even after retiring from two of the first three races.
This leads to some notable omissions on the list, it has to be said, including the double-figure race-winning Williams FW14B from 1992, the FW18B from 1996, a Red Bull 13-time race winner in the RB9 from 2013, and many other worthy contenders. This was the DAS, or ‘Dual Axis Steering’, which enabled Mercedes to reduce the drag even caused by the tyres to aid straight-line speed on their car, and the rest of the field was barely able to make a dent in their performances.
While the Scuderia qualified better than Red Bull for most of the season, Verstappen and the team’s race pace and strategy calls often got the better of their rivals as the Dutchman eventually cruised to a second World title in style – by a whopping 146 points come season’s end. Over one lap in qualifying and on race pace, it would be years before the F2004 would be beaten by Formula 1 cars of the future. With refuelling still in play, the ‘sprint’ element of the sport was evident in race trim and Schumacher especially was able to pump in qualifying-style laps with ease in a car which gave him confidence like few others ever could.
The Bahrain Grand Prix of that season, now dubbed the ‘Duel in the Desert’, underlined just how much faster Mercedes were than the rest when the gloves came off. There were 12 one-two finishes this time for Hamilton and Rosberg, and only two races in which neither driver finished on the podium. Their combined 703 points in the Constructors’ Championship was 86% of the maximum number available throughout the whole course of the season, too. Now, that’s dominance for you.Now, we’re heading all the way back to the beginnings of the Formula 1 World Championship, and the ‘Alfetta’ itself.
The 158 would later be updated into the 159 for the 1951 season, where its success continued for another year as Alfa Romeo showed themselves to be a dominant early force in Formula 1, before being forced to quit the sport prior to 1952, as it could not gain the financial support required to meet its extensive development needs.