Following on from yesterday, here is part two of the 2017 driver rankings - tenth to fourth. 10. Lewis EllingtonLewis Ellington was parachuted into Holmqvist after five races and a strong start to his IndyVirtual season as replacement for Aron Einarsson. He immediately impressed by beating Kiara Thunder in his first qualifying session and then race, but was bested in Germany before she was replaced by Dwyer. From then Ellington monopolised qualifying within the team, but his race performances - while strong - failed to stand out. He was consistent, but beaten regularly by Dwyer, with fifth in Italy his best performance. 9. Will HoskinsWill Hoskins had a season to forget compared to his usual standard as he finished outside of the top ten for the first time in his career, but nonetheless he was still mightily impressive. Partnered with the highly-rated young Dutchman Felix Beyer, Hoskins somewhat dominated between the pair and scored over three times as many points, despite finishing 11th five times in the last seven races. In Spain he worked the contra-strategy brilliantly for fourth, while his low point was the first race of the season, where for the only race all year Beyer out-classed him. 8. Elroy WagnerIf Hoskins somewhat dominated, Elroy Wagner annihilated James Harding, and had it not been for a lax weekend at Indianapolis he would have had a clean sweep. Despite rarely having a car to score points he picked up 18 across four separate finishes, with the best result being an incredible fifth in Japan. He also took a shock front row start in Australia and led before slipping back. He was prone to the occasional error however, such as the silly mistake in Malaysia that saw him crash into Ruiz's retired car, but overall Wagner was on the top of his game. 7. Klaas van SnelheidKlaas van Snelheid lost out on the world title by just two points, but only sits seventh in the rankings. Frankly, he's lucky to even be in the top ten. The Dutchman was a rookie when the season began but came with an incredible compliment of titles to his name, yet he never quite had that final flourish. He was good, and on his day very good, but only once did he come out on top of a battle with Powers where the eventual Champion didn't suffer some kind of bad luck. That was France and was easily his best showing, while he was disappointingly off the pace in Germany. Why is Klaas so high then? Well, while he was often beaten by Powers, when he was it was usually marginal, and evidently the double World Champion is no slouch. 6. Karl BeckenbauerKarl Beckenbauer beat Puccio Giodano at Ocelot, beat Jochem van Snelheid at Ocelot, and then beat Judson Sikes at North Star for good measure. If anyone was in form at the end of 2017 it was Beckenbauer, the German even marching to a shock maiden victory for North Star in Canada. He was strong throughout the season regardless of the car and finished ninth in the Championship in what was effectively just half a season. Westwood will be rubbing their hands will glee at the prospect of having a clearly rejuvenated Beckenbauer in their car for 2018. 5. Arden HutchinsonArden Hutchinson was the only driver to outqualify his team mate(s) in every session both his teams cars completed in 2017. His race performances did not quite match up however, and Zozulya tied him 6-6 in the twelve races they both finished. He also only reached the podium twice to Zozulya's three however, and in China retirements played into his favour, while strategy helped him in Spain. Brazil was arguably one of his best drives in a last ditch attempt to secure himself a 2018 seat, but he had a number of off-colour races too. Take nothing away however, Hutchinson had a good season. 4. Tumo KinnumenIf you want to see a solid and consistent season however - constantly extracting the most from the car (save a slight disaster in the final three races) - then look no further than Tumo Kinnumen. The Finn had an incredible year in a Westwood that was only fifth fastest, scoring points in fourteen of the first fifteen races, only robbed of a sweep by a late collision in Germany. Second in Italy was good but third in Bahrain was his drive of the season, but he was often run close by rookie team mate Finn Schnyder. He heads to Holmqvist in 2018 where he will reunite with former team mate Will Hoskins, the two set to provide one of the most intriguing battles of the upcoming season.
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