The rookies tend not to get the best seats, so these days a rookie with a great season is going to be rare, isn't it? It's all relative. Tsunoda landing in the Alpha Tauri should have given him a nice start but he has not grabbed it with both hands.
Villeneuve (Jaques) had a great rookie season, so did Hamilton, who as I recall nearly pipped Kimi to the title. A single point was it? Montoya seemed an exciting rookie but it never really panned out. Senna was great in that old, slow Toleman. But yeah, in recent history Leclerc probably. There's is so much competition for seats now, with many viable drivers without one. Hard for rookies to make an impression.
Still, you gotta dance with who brung ya, and both Mazepin and Tsunoda have looked at times out of their depth. Schumacher seems more well-suited at this stage, but he's not done anything really to raise an eyebrow.
As for Hungary this weekend. Track temp today was over 60C, which is very hot of course. Temps are expected to cool a bit over the next two days, with a threat of rain. Max complained of understeer all day, and we will see if the engineers get a handle on that for tomorrow. I'm not an Ocon fan, but I love seeing the order shaken up so hoping he can kick on from today's result.
