After 15 races, George Russell remains the season’s biggest net loser of grid-to-flag positions at −7. But Baku’s sharp swings — including Oscar Piastri going from P3 to P13 — have tightened the fight just behind him.
By Elena Marsh
George Russell still sits first in the 2026 ‘Most positions lost’ table after the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, holding a season total of −7. That matters because this metric isn’t about outright pace or points; it’s a running audit of how many places you’ve bled from your starting position to the final classification, summed across every classified race started from the grid.
Baku didn’t bring a change at the top, but it did underline the unusual shape of Russell’s season: he won from pole, finishing P1 after starting P1, a zero-swing Sunday. Yet over 15 rounds he remains the driver with the most net places lost, which highlights just how much earlier damage he has had to carry — and why a single clean, controlled weekend can be as important for this ranking as a comeback drive.
The biggest shake-up comes from Oscar Piastri, who rockets from 13th to 3rd in the season ranking, the largest positional jump among the key movers at +10 places. The immediate Baku trigger is clear in the raw race movement: Piastri started 3rd and finished 13th, a loss of 10 places in one classified result over 51 laps.
That one swing is enough to drag his season total to −1 — which sounds modest, but in a ranking where the top end is currently only −7, it is more than enough to turn the top group into a three-way story. Piastri’s move also flips the complexion of the top three itself: he’s now ahead of several drivers who were previously occupying those slots, and his entry is part of a wider churn in the top 10 after this round.
Charles Leclerc is now second overall on −4, sitting between Russell’s −7 and Piastri’s −1. With the top three split by only six net places from first to third, this is a ranking where a single messy afternoon can rewrite the order — exactly what Baku demonstrated.
The more revealing point is how differently these totals can be built. Russell just banked a weekend with no net loss at all — pole, win, P1 to P1 — but remains the leader because this system is cumulative. Meanwhile Piastri’s season number is barely negative, yet he is already third because others around him have either stabilised or improved their net movement, leaving a small gap to climb into.
Not everyone’s Baku story is about losing ground on the road; sometimes it’s about losing ground in the ranking itself. Nico Hülkenberg drops six places from 4th to 10th, carrying a season value of +8. His Azerbaijan Grand Prix result went the other way to the ranking’s theme — he started 18th and finished 11th — yet the cumulative season picture still shifts him toward the edge of the top 10 rather than away from it.
Arvid Lindblad also falls six ranking places, sliding from 10th to 16th with a season figure of +14, and he is the name that exits the top 10 after round 15. That’s a significant swing because it widens the middle of the table: the top 10 isn’t simply a list of the year’s biggest net droppers, it’s increasingly a moving boundary where one weekend can be the difference between being tracked as a season-long trend and being outside the spotlight.
| Driver | Team | Before | After | Δ | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oscar Piastri | McLaren | 13 | 3 | +10 | −1 |
| Nico Hülkenberg | Audi | 4 | 10 | -6 | +8 |
| Arvid Lindblad | RB F1 Team | 10 | 16 | -6 | +14 |
Russell’s −7 lead survives a Baku weekend where he took a zero-swing win from pole, but the chase is reshaped: Leclerc on −4 and Piastri on −1 have compressed the top three into a small window. With the top-10 cut line already shifting — Lindblad out, Piastri in — the ranking looks set to remain volatile whenever a front-runner has a double-digit drop like P3 to P13.