LONDON, 9 April 2019:
Formula One (F1) celebrates its 1,000th world championship race this weekend at the Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai, one of the sport’s newer tracks, but the milestone requires careful wording.
The sport has often had a problem with anniversaries, with statisticians quibbling over how many starts teams and drivers have made according to different definitions – and this one is no exception.
The fact is some of the 999 championship races thus far have been questionable grands prix and several past race winners never even drove a F1 car.
From 1950 to 1960 – 11 races in all – the Indianapolis 500 was included as part of the championship even if very few F1 drivers crossed the Atlantic to compete in it and home-grown racers took all the points and raced to their own rules.
Bill Vukovich finished seventh in the 1953 F1 championship, and sixth in 1954, after winning the Indy 500 in those years but racing in no other rounds.
His death in the 1955 Indy technically made him the first driver to be killed while competing in a F1 championship race.
Yet Vukovich never drove a F1 car – even if his F1 record stands at a remarkable two wins, one pole position, three fastest laps and 19 points from five races – all of them in Indiana.
By the time Britain’s Jim Clark won at The Brickyard in 1965, followed by compatriot and fellow F1 champion Graham Hill in 1966, the Indy 500 was no longer part of the F1 calendar.
In 1952 and 1953, the world championship was run to Formula Two rules due to there not being enough F1 cars to fill the grid after Alfa Romeo pulled out.
That means, therefore, that 26 races included in the championship tally since the first at Silverstone in 1950 did not actually feature F1 cars.
The sport cannot truly say China is the 1,000th grand prix either, since there have been such events since the early 20th century when France set the terms and language of automobile racing.
Hungarian driver Ferenc Szisz is generally regarded as the first winner of a grand prix, at Le Mans in 1906, while the Monaco Grand Prix, glamour race of the current calendar, dates back to 1929.
Silverstone, a former World War Two airfield in central England, hosted grands prix in 1948 and 1949 before Giuseppe ‘Nino’ Farina won the first F1 world championship race there on 13 May 1950.
Calling China the 1,000th F1 race would be similarly inaccurate since there have been numerous non-championship F1 races staged down the decades.
The last was at Brands Hatch in 1983 when reigning world champion Keke Rosberg stood on top of a podium that also featured American Danny Sullivan and Australia’s 1980 F1 champion Alan Jones.
Nigel Mansell, F1 world champion in 1992, was a non-finisher that day.
While it is often stated that only two women have raced in the F1 world championship, South African Desire Wilson won a round of the British F1 championship in a Wolf at Brands Hatch in 1980.
South Africa also had its own local F1 championship in the 1960s and up until 1975.
The 1,000th race to count towards the official FIA drivers’ world championship standings? More accurate perhaps, if not exactly catchy.
The following are some of the main numbers:
0.5 – Points scored by women drivers in F1 history. Only two women have started a race, both Italian — Maria Teresa de Filippis and Lella Lombardi. Lombardi finished sixth in Spain in 1975, with half points awarded after the race was cut short due to a fatal accident.
1 – One posthumous champion, Austrian Jochen Rindt who died during practice for Lotus at Monza in 1970. His widow Nina collected the trophy.
7 – The most championships won by a driver, with Germany’s Michael Schumacher taking his seventh in 2004 with Ferrari.
10 – British champions, a record for any country. Brazil, Germany and Finland each have three. 19 Britons have won races.
15/16 – Ferrari have won 15 drivers’ championships, more than any other team. They have also won 16 constructors’ titles, another record, and six were consecutive between 1999 and 2004.
17/18 – Dutch driver Max Verstappen was 17 when he became the youngest F1 driver with Toro Rosso. He was the youngest race winner at 18, with Red Bull, at the 2016 Spanish GP.
21 – Countries to have had a race winning driver.
29 – Titles decided in the last race of the season. Most recently in 2016, when Germany’s Nico Rosberg took the title for Mercedes in Abu Dhabi.
33 – The number of world champions, from Giuseppe Farina to Hamilton. There are 20 still living, with Jackie Stewart (1969, 1971 and 1973) the longest standing.
34 – Constructors to have won races. The top four (Ferrari, McLaren, Williams and Mercedes) have won 620 of 999 so far.
46 – Oldest world champion. Argentina’s Juan Manuel Fangio in 1957 was 46 years and 41 days when he won his fifth title.
53 – The oldest race winner, at 53, was Italian Luigi Fagioli who was born in 1898 and contested seven championship races in 1950 and 1951. He won in France in 1951 and died in 1952 during Monaco GP practice.
55 – Monaco’s Louis Chiron remains the oldest driver to start a race, in his home grand prix in 1955.
61 – The number of constructors’ championships so far. Since Vanwall won the first in 1958, 15 teams have been champions.
71 – The number of tracks to have hosted a race. A total of 32 nations, not including Luxembourg and San Marino whose names were on grands prix held in Germany and Italy respectively, have held F1 races.
83 – Ferrari have had a record 83 one-two finishes over the years, with McLaren next on 47. Mercedes have 46.
84 – No driver has had more pole positions than Lewis Hamilton, who took his 84th in Australia in March.
91 – Most races won by a driver, set by Schumacher whose last was in China in 2006 with Ferrari (his 72nd for the team).
99 – Since 1950, 99 drivers have started a race on pole position. Leclerc, in Bahrain last month, was the 99th in the 999th race.
107 – F1 race winners, including Indianapolis 500 between 1950 and 1960.
155 – Most podium appearances by a driver, Schumacher again.
163 – British drivers, more than any other country.
220 – Poles for Ferrari, a record. McLaren are next on 155.
235 – Wins for Ferrari, the oldest team in the sport and only ones to have raced in every season. McLaren are on 182.
323 – Brazilian Rubens Barrichello, Schumacher’s team mate at Ferrari, started more races than any driver.
752 – Podium finishes for Ferrari, another record.
764 – Drivers to have started an F1 race.
974 – Races participated in by Ferrari (972 starts).
- Reuters