The poll for the most popular F1 driver has announced its results! Which position is Hamilton or Verstappen in?

There are indeed many candidates. Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen have a big fan base, of course, but the competition is not small. The two McLaren drivers, George Russell of Williams and the legendary Kimi Räikkönen are also very popular figures in Formula 1. Who is your favourite?

Motorsport Network, in collaboration with F1 and Nielsen Sports, created a poll to determine which driver is the most popular among fans.

The results of this global survey (over 167,000 fans in 187 different countries were involved) were released ahead of the US Grand Prix. This is the seventh poll since 2005, with the last one taking place in 2017.

You might expect Hamilton to be the winner, given his popularity, as he was in 2017. However, the seven-time world champion doesn’t feature in first or second place. The 36-year-old Mercedes driver can be found in third place with a 1.9% loss to the poll winner. However, he is also number 1 in the over-45 category.

The battle for the top spot was very close, with Verstappen winning the poll and being the favourite with 14.4% of fans. Understandably, he was the clear favourite in the Netherlands, making him the most popular driver in the USA and Japan.

The Red Bull driver is followed by Lando Norris with 13.7%. The McLaren driver was also narrowly beaten in the vote for the UK’s favourite driver, where Lewis Hamilton is still number one.

Just behind him in the results is Daniel Ricciardo with 10%, with Sebastian Vettel in fifth (9%). Both of these drivers have received very strong support in their home countries, Ricciardo in Australia, Vettel in Germany.

In other positions we find Charles Leclerc, Fernando Alonso, Räikkönen, Russell and Pierre Gasly.

The team standings were also very interesting. McLaren dominated the poll quite clearly. The Woking-based team received 29.5% of the vote and topped the rankings in the UK, USA, Canada, Brazil and Australia. Since 2017, McLaren has managed to almost double its popularity. It is also the most popular team in Europe.

Almost 20% of the votes went to second-placed Red Bull, which logically had the biggest advantage in Asia, specifically Japan. Of course, the fact that Red Bull started a partnership with Japan’s Honda in 2018 did its part.

The biggest drop since 2017 was recorded by Ferrari, with the Italian stable taking a whopping 32% of the vote! This year, the team from Maranello has won just 18%. Up in fourth place we find Mercedes with 11.9%.

Far behind the big four, then, at number 5 is Alpine, chased by Williams, Aston Martin and Alpha Tauri. Second to last in the final standings is Alfa Romeo and clearly the last, least popular team is Haas.

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