There were 13 different winners throughout the 13 rounds of the 2023 FIA Formula 2 Championship and several starring performances from talented drivers up and down the grid. Here’s who we think was most impressive in 2023…

By Steven Walton

10. Enzo Fittipaldi (P7, 124 points)

Rodin Carlin driver Enzo Fittipaldi’s second full F2 campaign was admittedly a bit mediocre, especially compared with his performances last year in the much smaller Charouz team. A highlight for the 22-year-old was his first-ever F2 victory in the Spa sprint race, which he earned by forcing his way past Richard Verschoor for the lead on the Kemmel straight on the penultimate lap. The next day, Fittipaldi backed up the win with third in the feature race from eighth on the grid.

Ultimately, Fittipaldi wasn’t able to produce results such as this at every round. The only other weekends when he threatened the front were Baku and Barcelona. In both, he qualified second and finished in that position in the feature races. He also nearly won another sprint in Abu Dhabi but couldn’t hold off a fired-up Frederik Vesti.

Fittipaldi finished the year seventh in the championship, but he could have delivered more given his F2 experience.

9. Jak Crawford (P13, 57 points)

Hitech GP driver Jak Crawford showed flashes of speed this year, though his best results came in the reverse-grid sprint races. Four of his five podiums this year, including his maiden win, were in sprint races. His only feature race podium came from the damp Zandvoort race that saw several frontrunners crash. To Crawford’s credit, he stayed out of trouble and brought his car home that day.

The highlight of Crawford’s year – albeit one that came under sombre circumstances – was his sole win in the damp sprint race at the Red Bull Ring, the same track where he took his only win in F3 too. A dry-weather pole position in Zandvoort was another high point, though he failed to convert it to a victory.

Crawford finished 13th in the championship, one place ahead of teammate Isack Hadjar. While that result may not stand out, he drove respectably for an 18-year-old rookie who was never in the championship hunt in F3.

8. Zane Maloney (P10, 96 points) 

Red Bull junior Zane Maloney was fast but inconsistent this year. Take the first two rounds as an example: the Rodin Carlin driver starred in the feature race in Bahrain, carving his way from 18th on the grid to third, but a week later in Jeddah, he spun out of the sprint and finished 17th in the feature. 

Maloney finished the year with just eight points finishes, but four of those were feature race podiums, which demonstrates his ability to score big points. Alongside his Bahrain recovery drive, his second place in the Zandvoort feature race stood out this year. Not only did he survive in difficult conditions, but he delivered a bold overtake on Crawford around the outside at turn one on lap 17, earning him second place.

Maloney finished 10th in the championship. He scored fewer points than teammate Fittipaldi, but that was to be expected because he was a rookie.

7. Kush Maini (P11, 62 points)

Kush Maini was one of the biggest surprises of 2023. Expectations were low for the Indian driver given he finished 14th in F3 the year before and joined Campos Racing, 2022’s last-place team. Yet Maini showed from day one in F2 that he had impressive raw pace, qualifying sixth on debut in Bahrain and continuing to qualify inside the top 10 regularly as the year went on.

Relative to qualifying, he often struggled for pace in races, though he still fought hard for results. In the Hungary sprint, for one, he tried valiantly but unsuccessfully to hold off Théo Pourchaire for the podium after having started from pole.

Maini outscored his more experienced teammate Ralph Boschung and recorded the biggest points haul for a Campos driver in F2 since Jack Aitken scored 159 in 2019.

6. Ayumu Iwasa (P4, 165 points)

DAMS driver Ayumu Iwasa was easily the most competitive Red Bull–backed driver this season, though he was never quite at the level of championship protagonists Vesti or Pourchaire. Still, he took opportunities when they arose and quietly picked up good results.

He was at his strongest early in the season, picking up three wins in the first five rounds, but he saved his best drive of the year for the penultimate round in Monza. In the feature race, with the help of safety cars and a stunning 17-lap stint on the supersoft tyre, he recovered from 15th on the grid to second.

Iwasa also comprehensively outperformed his teammate Arthur Leclerc throughout 2023, scoring more than three times as many points as the Monégasque rookie. Iwasa held third in the championship for much of the season but disappointingly lost it to Jack Doohan in the season finale.

5. Ollie Bearman (P6, 130 points)

Ferrari have found something special with 18-year-old Ollie Bearman. You only need to look at his memorable heroics in Baku, on his fourth weekend in F2, to see his raw talent.

Not only did he take pole position in a damaged car, but he went on to win both the sprint and feature races. It was a fairy-tale weekend – and it wasn’t the end of his success. Bearman also showed maturity beyond his years and superb resistance to pressure on his way to feature race wins in Barcelona and Monza.

The Ferrari junior’s biggest challenge for 2024 will be displaying his blistering pace at more rounds. There were a handful of weekends this year – Bahrain, Monaco and Abu Dhabi come to mind – when he didn’t have frontrunning pace. He ended 2023 sixth in the championship and as the second-best rookie.

4. Jack Doohan (P3, 168 points)

Jack Doohan was expected to be a championship contender throughout 2023, but he endured a torrid start to the year that ruined his chances. He struggled to get on top of his discomfort with his Virtuosi car until an in-season test in Barcelona that followed the fourth round in Baku.

From this point onwards, Doohan scored more points than both Pourchaire and Vesti. His comeback in the second half of 2023 was one of the storylines of this season, and when he grabbed consecutive feature race wins in Budapest and Spa, it felt as though he could go all the way. His hopes took a hit in Zandvoort, however, when he spun out just before the rolling start for the feature race.

Given how poorly his season started, Doohan’s recovery was classy, but he could only manage to get back to third. He won’t return to F2 in 2024.

3. Victor Martins (P5, 150 points)

Yes, he had a scrappy year, but Alpine Academy driver Victor Martins showed frighteningly fast pace nearly every weekend in 2023. He took pole at Jeddah, Spielberg and Silverstone and racked up 10 podiums, the same number as his ART Grand Prix teammate and eventual champion Pourchaire.

Martins could’ve been a genuine championship contender this season, but his own mistakes early in the year let him down. He spun from the lead in the Jeddah feature race, crashed on his own in the Baku sprint, and got a costly penalty in Monaco when he didn’t slow down for yellow flags. Still, the mistakes shouldn’t overshadow what was otherwise an impressive rookie season for the 2022 F3 champion.

Martins finished fifth in the championship and as the highest-placed rookie. If he returns as expected to ART Grand Prix in 2024, he will be tough to beat.

2. Théo Pourchaire (P1, 203 points)

ART Grand Prix driver Théo Pourchaire won this year’s championship, but he misses out on the number one spot on this list because he didn’t stand out as much as a talented driver in their third year of F2 should.

After finishing as the runner-up in 2022, Pourchaire remained with the frontrunning ART squad. At the season opener in Bahrain, Pourchaire was ruthless, taking pole by three-quarters of a second and winning the feature race by more than 20 seconds. These are the sorts of performances that should’ve been commonplace for him this year, but in reality, he never dominated again. Bahrain was his only win this year and his final one in F2.

Still, this isn’t to say he had a bad year. Pourchaire deservedly won the championship thanks to his dogged consistency, exemplified by 19 points finishes across the season. There were 12 more feature races after Bahrain, and Pourchaire graced the podium in half of them.

1. Frederik Vesti (P2, 192 points)

Prema driver and Mercedes junior Frederik Vesti could’ve been the 2023 champion, but his season was derailed by feature race retirements at Silverstone, Spa, Zandvoort and Monza. It’s important to remember that only one of the incidents, his reconnaissance lap crash at Spa, was entirely Vesti’s fault.

If you look past those weekends, Vesti was often the class of the field. He was untouchable when he won the Monaco feature race from pole position. He also won in Jeddah by keeping it clean while others around him crashed out. In sprint races in Barcelona and Silverstone, he eased his way to victory despite wet weather, proving he was adaptable and clinical.

Vesti fought for the championship until the end, taking his fourth sprint victory of the year in Abu Dhabi and following it up the next day with a feature race podium. Still, it wasn’t enough to offset the points he had lost from his retirements. Vesti finished second in the championship, 11 points adrift of Pourchaire.

Header photo credit: Sebastiaan Rozendaal / Dutch Photo Agency via Red Bull Content Pool