Greatest (non-championship-winning) Season Performances

[Rob Dylan]

In recent history, people talk about how good Alonso's 2012 season was, and Ricciardo's was last year. And it got me thinking that neither of those drivers won the championship after having arguably the best season of their careers. What examples would you guys give for the best season-long campaigns which didn't necessarily win the driver the championship? In recent history mine would be:

2003 Juan Pablo Montoya - this was the season where he took his unquestionable pace and ability to overtake into an awesome campaign that only bad luck towards the end could stop. He ironed out his flaws and comprehensively beat his teammate after Ralf's campaign faded.
2005 Kimi Raikkonen - metronomic consistency in one of the fastest cars on the grid, brought down to earth by dark forces that took him out of every second race that year
2008 Felipe Massa and Robert Kubica - both of these drivers had their best seasons that year, in a year where momentum kept shifting to different teams. Both of them beat their more experienced, more highly-regarded teammates, and both were genuine title contenders to the end. However, Kubica suffered from his car slowing in pace and Massa's luck kept switching race-by-race
2011 Jenson Button - mature consistency won Button the day against a world champion team-mate who kept falling by the wayside, and he presented some of the only real threats to Vettel's dominance all year. Especially important after many questioned Button's true ability competing against the very best.
2012 Fernando Alonso - In a mediocre Ferrari, he managed to bring in podiums and wins that threatened to win a topsy-turvy championship. It was only when Red Bull regained their hideous dominance of 2011 that Alonso was beaten, but even then it went down to the wire at the final race.
2014 Daniel Ricciardo - when Mercedes was leading one of the most dominating championships ever, the new boy in Red Bull, Daniel Ricciardo was the only other driver who won a race (3 in total), and after Round 12 was genuinely still a title contender. He also consistently beat his team-mate who happened to have just won his fourth consecutive title the previous year. Not bad.

[Izzyeviel]

1999 - Heinz Harald Frentzen.

[Salamander]

2010 Robert Kubica - Contrary to popular opinion, 2008 was not Kubica's best year. 2010 was. There was never a race when he didn't extract the best from the Renault - the question was usually only how far could he drag the Renault up the grid from where it should be. And in a season in which the ultra-reliability meant the podium was dominated by McLaren, Ferrari, and Red Bull, he still managed to drag the fifth-best car to three podiums; a stunning second in the wet at Melbourne, a third from the front row at Monaco after arguably the lap of the decade, and then another third at Spa. He was a contender to win three Grands Prix (Monaco, Spa, Suzuka) - an outside contender for sure, but it would not have taken too much for him to actually be the winner.

In the fifth-best car.

[Rob Dylan]

I realise I accidentally posted this to the wrong forum. Moderator, could you help us out, my good man

[Bobby Doorknobs]

Some good seasons listed here, but I'd like to add Stirling Moss in 1961. Similar to Ricciardo last year, Moss won races in a year where one team blew away the competition, and in Monaco and the Nurburgring to boot.

I'll probably think of more later.

[Dj_bereta]

1999 - Heinz Harald Frentzen.

Yes. Frentzen was close to fight for the title until the European Grand Prix, when his car stopped.

1999 - Rubems Barrichello: Couple of podiums and even a pole position in an average Stewart Ford(4th~5th best car, at the best). He could had won the title in a McLaren or Ferrari for sure.

2000 - Mika Hakkinen: He lost a lot of points due McLaren poor reability in that year (he scored his first points only in the 4th race of the season) and fought for the title until the Japanese Grand Prix. Is worth to mention his amazing overtake in Spa, one of the best of all times.

[AndreaModa]

1992 - Michael Schumacher - won a race and finished ahead of Ayrton in the standings as best of the rest behind the Williams cars in arguably a worse car than the McLaren. Definitely a worse engine. And all in only his first full season.

[good_Ralf]

Kimi Raikkonen in 2003 - Drove an updated version of the 2002 McLaren to a win (could have been more) and several podiums and nearly usurped Michael Schumacher's 6th title from him. He would have done it if he avoided making at least one of the mistakes he made during the season e.g. the Canada qualifying crash or the DTP in Australia.

Ayrton Senna in 1993 - His years at Lotus and some previous seasons at McLaren were also definitely stellar but here he dragged a down on power McLaren-Ford to 5 awesome wins and clearly pushed the McLaren as far as it could go without fault. Drove the lap of the year at Donington, of course,
I think Ayrton had really matured as a driver at this point since he was having far fewer incidents than he was prone to in the past [noob statement].

[Rob Dylan]

Kimi Raikkonen in 2003 - Drove an updated version of the 2002 McLaren to a win (could have been more) and several podiums and nearly usurped Michael Schumacher's 6th title from him. He would have done it if he avoided making at least one of the mistakes he made during the season e.g. the Canada qualifying crash or the DTP in Australia.

I was considering Raikkonen for either '03 or '05 - those being his best seasons imo - but I feel he did make quite a few mistakes in the former, especially in Spain where he messed up qualifying before crashing about 1 second into the race start. Crashing out in Hockenheim after being far too opportunistic on the start also took away any chance of points the moment the race started. That's why I felt 2005 was a much more solid year for him, because he drove far more maturely and it was the car rather than him wrecking his weekends

[FullMetalJack]

Fernando Alonso in 2012 is the obvious answer to this, as stated.

I'd argue Alain Prost in 1988 has to be considered, given that he did technically outscore Ayrton Senna that year.

Also, I knew it'd only be a matter of time until Salamander mentioned Kubica's 2010 season.

[Rabbi Gordon]

Some outsiders here:
Olivier Panis' 1997 - Until the accident, he was really outperforming the car and was a constant top contender. I believe he could have legit won a race in that year.

Mika Hakkinen's 1992 - A car that was capable of DNQing and had an outdated engine in it, sometimes it would go fast, but the mechanical woes were around the corner in every minute. Mika still got in the points 6 times and finished outside of the only thrice.

Michele Alboreto's 1985 - He had it against Prost in a worse car and could very well have become champion if not for the chain of drivetrain problems in the final races.

Niki Lauda's 1976 - Obvious, I guess.

Mike Hailwood's 1972 - An outsider pick, but not having raced open wheels in 5 years, and being in a less-than-stellar car finishing every race he could in the points and almost winning one is amazing.

Wolfgang von Trips's 1961 - He could have finished every race on the podium and walked away with the championship.

Moss, Collins and Brooks also had seasons belonging here, that's sure.

[UncreativeUsername37]

Fernando Alonso in 2014, imploded his teammate and always took the maximum out of the car, but it went very underappreciated compared to 2012. He'd been the best driver for the previous two years and it didn't change then. I know all driver rankings of that year go Ricciardo, Alonso, Hamilton but personally I think it's bias/delusion (stronger words than I'm looking for but that's the general idea) from Ricciardo being exciting and new and unexpected.

[novitopoli]

Fernando Alonso - 2009: A podium and a pole in a dreadfully slow car no one else was able to score points with.

Ivan Capelli - 1992:

[Aguaman]

Alonso in 2010 and 2012 stand out to me. It was him v. the Red Bulls & Hamilton (2010)

[FullMetalJack]

Fernando Alonso in 2014, imploded his teammate and always took the maximum out of the car, but it went very underappreciated compared to 2012. He'd been the best driver for the previous two years and it didn't change then. I know all driver rankings of that year go Ricciardo, Alonso, Hamilton but personally I think it's bias/delusion (stronger words than I'm looking for but that's the general idea) from Ricciardo being exciting and new and unexpected.

I think it may have something to do with the fact that I expect it from Alonso. Ricciardo was a genuine and pleasant surprise.

[Miguel98]

Mark Webber in 2010 - Bar Alonso, he was the most impressive driver that year. He drove through the year almost perfectly in his chances, and could win the title, until he choked it away in Korea with that silly mistake. Bar that, it was Webber's best year as a racing driver, and one could argue that he was the second (third, since Kubica is OF BOSS) best driver on the grid that year. Despite that, still lost the title, and finished 3rd. Such is life.

[Bobby Doorknobs]

Surely Max Chilton in 2013 is worthy of mention?

[tommykl]

Dan Gurney's 1965 deserves a mention, with five podiums to end the year.

Also, Clay Regazzoni's 1974 when he piled on podium after podium to be a title contender to the very end.

[Salamander]

2014 Jeff Gordon - looked like the Jeff Gordon of 15-20 years previous, a contender at pretty much every race, and led the championship for most of the year - until the damn Chase ruined everything. *grumble grumble*

... what? Nothing said it's F1 only.

[Wallio]

HHF in '99. Especially considering Hill did bathblug in the second car.

And controversially, Schumi in '96. He took an utter heap to three wins, after how many years of Ferrari futility?

[girry]

Dan's 2014 has to be the very best I've witnessed.

If we're going to dig up things from the history, I'd argue Fangio's 1950 warrants a mention

[James1978]

For one not mentioned at all yet - Nigel Mansell in 1987. There were several races (Monaco, Germany, Hungary, Portugal) where he was easily beating Piquet when his car went wrong through no fault of his own, not to mention what he could have done if he'd taken part in the last 2 races.

[UncreativeUsername37]

1964 was part of the era where Jim Clark was literally the greatest ever, but yeah, Lotus reliability.

[girry]

The forgotten one: Jacques Laffite 1981, Ligier-Matra. A car-engine combination so useless his respected team-mates Jarier, Jabouille, Tambay never broke into top six in qualifying not race all season - Jabouille even recorded DNQ's; whereas Jacques himself was dragging the JS17 onto podium time and again - and still had an outside title chance come the final race at Caesars Palace!

[Salamander]

In fairness to Jabouille, he never really recovered from the broken leg he suffered in 1980.

[MorbidelliObese]

I wasn't alive to see it - in fact my parents were literally babies at the time - but on the face of it Stirling Moss's 1958 I think takes some beating. Won quadruple the races of the champion, of the races he finished he won all but one of them, and winning in two different cars (including taking the first ever WC rear engined victory). Not to mention that act of sportsmanship in Portugal that without which actually would have seen him take the title by a point..

[More_Blue_Flags]

This might be a bit further down towards the midfield than what you had in mind, but how about Michele Alboreto's 1982? Alboreto certainly had his share of luck with disqualifications in Brazil and Long Beach getting him a few more points and the FOCA teams boycotting Imola, but ... he was still the best placed non-Turbo driver after the two McLarens, destroyed his teammate(s), and managed to combine strong points finishes at two of the most turbo-friendly tracks of the season with a classy maiden win in Las Vegas. There was some pretty decent driving throughout most of the year, with only Zandvoort coming to mind as a poor performance.

And all this after a scoreless maiden season in 1981, too...

[WeirdKerr]

For one not mentioned at all yet - Nigel Mansell in 1987. There were several races (Monaco, Germany, Hungary, Portugal) where he was easily beating Piquet when his car went wrong through no fault of his own, not to mention what he could have done if he'd taken part in the last 2 races.

The previous year 1986 when he lost the championship due to his tyre failing in Adelaide(or thinking about it he would have won if he had finished ahead of Senna in Jerez those 3 points lost by the smallest of gaps....)
Also 1991 when he mounted a late challenge (the images of him wheel to wheel with Senna at the first Barcelona race)

[Dj_bereta]

This might be a bit further down towards the midfield than what you had in mind, but how about Michele Alboreto's 1982? Alboreto certainly had his share of luck with disqualifications in Brazil and Long Beach getting him a few more points and the FOCA teams boycotting Imola, but ... he was still the best placed non-Turbo driver after the two McLarens, destroyed his teammate(s), and managed to combine strong points finishes at two of the most turbo-friendly tracks of the season with a classy maiden win in Las Vegas. There was some pretty decent driving throughout most of the year, with only Zandvoort coming to mind as a poor performance.

And all this after a scoreless maiden season in 1981, too...

His 1992 season is worth to mention too. Tons of 7th place finish. Using the actual f1 score system, he had finished ahead Alesi and Footwork Arrows ahead of Ferrari!

[DOSBoot]

For one not mentioned at all yet - Nigel Mansell in 1987. There were several races (Monaco, Germany, Hungary, Portugal) where he was easily beating Piquet when his car went wrong through no fault of his own, not to mention what he could have done if he'd taken part in the last 2 races.

The previous year 1986 when he lost the championship due to his tyre failing in Adelaide(or thinking about it he would have won if he had finished ahead of Senna in Jerez those 3 points lost by the smallest of gaps....)

That wouldn't have mattered anyways. He could have clinched it in Mexico, but screwed it up with a bad start.

[dr-baker]

Some drivers have had great seasons in which they could have won the title but threw it away at the end, like Mansell in '86 or Hamilton in '07. I suspect that few drivers will have debut seasons like Hamilton's (possibly barring Villeneuve in 1997). But he could have won the title. Would they count that as amongst their greatest non-championship-winning seasons?

[Aguaman]

So watching 1998 review - Michael Schumacher. Geez Hakkinen really wasn't that great and DC spun off a lot.