F1 history settled with data
The old arguments share one problem: they get settled with memories. Who was better, which car was further ahead, how much a transfer that never happened would have changed. All of them depend on comparing things that never shared a track, and there affection decides more than evidence does. These articles do something else: they put the candidates in the same car, or the same driver in every car, and re-run the championship hundreds or thousands of times until the machinery stops being an excuse. The conclusions are not always the comfortable ones. The order of an eleven-legend league turned out to match almost exactly the rating each one walks in with, four of seven dream transfers would have changed nothing because those cars won with anybody inside, and there are limits to the model that are worth saying out loud rather than hiding.
15 articles
The youngest drivers in F1: to start a race, take pole, stand on the podium and win
Verstappen started a race at 17 and won at 18, and Antonelli took Vettel’s pole record in 2026. The lists of the youngest to start, take pole, finish on the podium and win, how the age of debut has fallen since the fifties and whether winning young means a future champion.
15 October 2026 · 6 min read
F1 win records: overall, in a season, in a row and at the same circuit
Hamilton has won more races than anyone, and more times at a single circuit, and Verstappen won 19 of the 22 races of 2023, 10 of them in a row. The win records overall, in a season, as a share of the calendar, in a row and at a single circuit, and how much of each record season was the car according to our simulator.
15 October 2026 · 7 min read
F1 returns to Africa in Rwanda: the 24 races it already ran there, from Casablanca to Kyalami
Formula 1 has signed a ten-year deal with Rwanda and will race in Africa for the first time since 1993. We go through its 24 races on the continent, from Casablanca in 1958 to Kyalami in 1993: three titles decided there, Jim Clark's last win and the 1985 boycott. Plus a number: since it left, F1 has run 633 Grands Prix, more than in all its history before.
13 October 2026 · 8 min read
Nobody has won on all six continents: the four drivers who can be first when F1 returns to Africa
In 1,166 races, no Formula 1 driver has won on all six continents. Sixteen have done it on five, and thirteen of them are missing only Africa. Four are still racing: Hamilton, Verstappen, Norris and Russell. We look at why only two seasons ever visited all six, how close Senna came and who is missing what.
13 October 2026 · 6 min read
Sepang is back nine years on: from Verstappen's 2017 win to a Bahrain Grand Prix held in Malaysia
The Iran war cancelled the Bahrain Grand Prix and F1 moved it to Sepang, which had not held a race since 2017. We go through the circuit's 19 editions, the last one (Verstappen won the day after turning 20, with Hamilton leading the title race) and the ten drivers from that grid who are still racing. Plus a number: pole won 9 of 19 there, right on the average of its era.
28 September 2026 · 7 min read
How many drivers lose their seat mid-season: 163 replacements, and half of them never come back
Hadjar broke his wrist boxing and his absence moved three seats. We counted every replacement of a race driver since 1988: 163 across 39 seasons, and only 2008 and 2018 ended with the same twenty drivers that started. Of those who lost the car for good, 50.7% never raced another season. Plus the 1999 question: with the six races he missed, would Schumacher have been champion?
21 September 2026 · 11 min read
The biggest comebacks in F1: Antonelli at Monza is the second biggest winning drive ever
We counted the places gained between grid and flag across the 1,150 races held since 1950. Only 25 wins have come from ten places back or more, and Antonelli at Monza is the second biggest of them all. But the number we did not expect is another one: in the eighties 95% of races featured a ten place comeback and today 34% do, because almost nobody breaks down any more.
7 September 2026 · 7 min read
Where Grand Prix wins come from: 1,164 races since 1950
Four in five races are won by someone starting in the top three, and only 28 times in history has anyone won from outside the top ten. But the trend is the story: in the eighties pole converted 28% of the time, today it is 57%. The reason is not the circuits.
6 September 2026 · 6 min read
In the eighties four cars in ten finished. Today more than eight do
The biggest change in Formula 1 is invisible, because it happens in the workshop. Four straight decades below 52% of cars finishing, then a climb that has not stopped. And it explains something people do talk about: why fewer and fewer different drivers win.
5 September 2026 · 6 min read
In 1982, eleven different drivers won. In 2023, three
We counted the winners of every season since 1950. Variety has fallen decade after decade, and the years with fewest different winners are exactly the ones with the most races. The cause is not the one usually given: it was not more parity back then, it was that the favourite kept breaking.
4 September 2026 · 6 min read
Antonelli starts from the back at Monza, and a championship leader has lined up on the last row only nine times since 1950
He starts nineteenth on a new engine. A championship leader has lined up on the last row only nine times in 1,042 races, and in seven of them he finished: fifth on average. Our 300 Monza simulations give him the top five 68% of the time, almost exactly what he said he thought was realistic.
4 September 2026 · 7 min read
The closest title fights in F1: one was decided by half a point
We ranked all 77 seasons since 1950 by the points between champion and runner-up. Eight were won by a single point, one by half a point, the widest by 290.
2 September 2026 · 6 min read
How many races does it take for the best driver to win? 2,700 seasons measured
We re-ran 2007, 2010, 2021 and 2024 a hundred and fifty times each, with calendars of 5, 10, 16 and 22 races. In a lopsided year five races are already enough; in 2007, twenty-two are not, and forty barely help.
18 August 2026 · 8 min read
What new regulations do to the grid: 1,200 seasons measured
A normal year moves a car performance by 2.64 points; the year new rules arrive, 8.49. And 58% of regulation changes produce a new grid leader. The numbers behind why Formula 1 comes in eras.
6 August 2026 · 7 min read
What is the most dominant car in F1 history? 37 seasons measured with the same driver
The 2023 Red Bull RB19, and not narrowly: with an average driver it still wins nine races in ten. We sat the same driver in the best car of every season since 1988 to compare them on one scale. And the seasons that come out closest turn out to be, one by one, the most fondly remembered championships in F1.
5 August 2026 · 9 min read