Driver & constructor points: Portuguese grand prix

Just imagine. You're at the supermarket reaching for the frozen peas. Suddenly, Nikita Mazepin gets in the way. You're at the bowling alley going in for your first strike of the game. Nikita Mazepin walks in front of you, and you drop the ball on your foot. You're in bed in the throes of passion with your loved-one, who's dressed up as Barney the dinosaur for some reason. Nikita Mazepin pops his head from under the covers. Mazepin! Not again!

Mazepin's ability to block everyone made him the biggest losing driver in Portugal, with Raikkonen's front wing prang placing him in a close second place as he scored the only retirement of the race.

Alfa Romeo had a rotten race, with a Biege Flag helping them to the lion's share of the Losers Points. Our reason for giving them the Biege Flag is entirely petty, but they still would have been the biggest losers even without that extra 10 points. Oh and Raikkonen got confused about something obvious.

Who did poorly in Portugal? Read on.

DRIVER POINTS IN PORTUGAL

Sainz, Giovinazzi, Vettel, Stroll, Tsunoda, Russell, Schumacher, Latifi and Mazepin receive 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 points respectively for their finishing places outside the top ten. Raikkonen is bestowed with 10 points for his retirement at Portimão. 

Raikkonen gets the 5 points for Earliest Exit – actually the only exit, when he crashed into his team mate after getting confused by his steering wheel (no, really). Sainz was left ruing a bad race strategy as his plummet from fifth to eleventh during the race earned him the 5-point Backwards Bonus. Despite Bottas's efforts, it's Hamilton who gets his second minus-25 points Race Win penalty of the season.

As you'll know by now, we like to erratically give out Beige Flags: each one is worth 10 points. Bottas gets a Beige Flag for being lambasted by Ralf Schumacher, who criticised his attitude and his talent. You know when you've been Ralfed. 

Danish touring car champ Jason Watt called Vettel "a finished man": because this sounds like Danish mafia talk, we're giving a Beige Flag to Vettel before he gets whacked. And Mazepin gets a Flag for cockpit-blocking everywhere he went, notably getting in the way of Latifi at qualifying, and getting in the path of a lapping Perez during the race.

In summary: Mazepin 19 | Raikkonen 15 | Vettel 13 | Bottas 10 | Latifi 8 | Schumacher 7 | Russell 6 | Sainz 6 | Tsunoda 5 | Stroll 4 | Giovinazzi 2 | Hamilton -25

See how this affected your Losers Team here.

CONSTRUCTOR POINTS IN PORTUGAL

Ferrari, Alfa Romeo, AlphaTauri, Aston Martin, Williams and Haas get themselves 1, 2, 5, 7, 14 and 16 for their finishing places outside the top ten. Alfa Romeo pick up 10 DNF points for the single retirement of the race, and Sainz's disappointing race earns Ferrari 5 points for the Backwards Bonus. 

Mercedes pick up the Race Win penalty of minus 25 points. Will they stop at nothing to besmirch the name of loserdom? The word 'Mercedes' can be traced back to the Vulgar Latin word for 'pity'. Have they forgotten their roots? Come on, Mercedes, have pity on us losers: please finish 19th and 20th at the next grand prix.

Just one Beige Flag for constructors: this goes to Alfa Romeo. They lost their appeal over Raikkonen's penalty in Imola, which of course is a big blow to the team. But we're no longer bothered by that. They receive the Flag for reserve driver's Callum Ilott's head wobble during practice. Seriously, it was ridiculous. Is his neck made of blancmange? Even Ilott himself likened his head shakes to Churchill’s bulldog. A Beige Flag for the team? Oh yes.

In summary: Alfa Romeo 27 | Haas 16 | Williams 14 | Aston Martin 7 | Ferrari 6 | AlphaTauri 5 | Mercedes -25

See how this affected your Losers Team here.

MORE POINTS

Here are the Losers Team scores for Portugal.

And here's how it's affected the Standings.

WHAT'S NEXT?

This coming Sunday, we tootle up the road to Barcelona for the Spanish grand prix, then on May 23rd it's time to thread a motorcar through the eye of a needle at the Monaco grand prix. It's a big moment for the F1 Losers League on May 26th: this is when we unlock every team's first Ejector Seat. Expect some Losers Team changes. Meanwhile, there are still Pitlane Punts to play and DRS allocations to shift around.