What Car Number Was the Most Successfull?

[DOSBoot]

I noticed Ubik posting a question about Williams drivers having the number "1" on it, and that got me thinking. Out of all the numbers used in F1, which one of them won the most for a drivers championship? I'm also curious to know what other numbers have won it as well.

[FullMetalJack]

I'm assuming 1 is the most successful, Schumacher won 5 championships with that number.

[DOSBoot]

I'm assuming 1 is the most successful, Schumacher won 5 championships with that number.

Probably. Vettel in 2011, Alonso in 2006, Hakkinen in 1999, Shumacher in 1995, Senna in 1991, Prost in 1986. I don't know if they used the numbers that way for Brabham in 1960, Fangio in 1955-57, and Ascari in 1953.

[mario]

I'm assuming 1 is the most successful, Schumacher won 5 championships with that number.

Probably. Vettel in 2011, Alonso in 2006, Hakkinen in 1999, Shumacher in 1995, Senna in 1991, Prost in 1986. I don't know if they used the numbers that way for Brabham in 1960, Fangio in 1955-57, and Ascari in 1953.

In the early years it was very common, even when the driver in question was the defending champion, for that driver to be given a different number on a race by race basis depending on what the event organisers decided to do. After all, in the first few decades of the existence of the sport, it was really the track owners who called the shots when it came to racing because they had the most control over the finances of the sport: it is also why, when Bernie rose to prominence within FOCA, that he attacked the circuit owners rather than FISA at first.

Anyway, back to the original question; in 1960, Jack Brabham was given No. 18 for the Argentine GP (a race in which everybody has even numbered cars), No. 8 in Monaco (again, a race with only even numbered cars), No. 11 for the Belgian GP (where Phil Hill, who had finished just 4th in the standings the previous year, was given No. 1), No. 16 in France, No. 1 in Britain and No. 2 in the Portuguese and US GP's. As for Ascari in 1953, the numbers he was given in each race were 10 (Argentinian GP), 2 (Dutch GP),10 (Belgian GP),10 (French GP),5 (British GP),1 (German GP),46 (Swizz GP), 4 (Italian GP).

It is worth bearing in mind, therefore, that the usage of No. 1 to signify a defending champion is a later change - it isn't until the 1970's that the change comes about, and even then there were some anomalies (for example, in 1974 Ronnie Peterson was allocated No. 1 even though he had only finished 3rd in the standings and Stewart had retired from the sport the previous year).

[EDIT] Having taken a quick look at ChicaneF1.com, it does seem to confirm that No. 1 is the most successful in terms of total number of victories (163 victories), followed by No. 5 (127 victories) - surprisingly, this means that cars wearing No. 5 are statistically far more successful than the cars wearing No. 2, 3 or 4.

[Londoner]

I distinctly remember both Hamilton and Button winning their respective titles whilst driving a car numbered 22.

[Sunshine_Baby_[IT]]

I distinctly remember both Hamilton and Button winning their respective titles whilst driving a car numbered 22.

And probably no one will never win a championship again... it's on HRT if I'm not wrong.

[DOSBoot]

I'm assuming 1 is the most successful, Schumacher won 5 championships with that number.

Probably. Vettel in 2011, Alonso in 2006, Hakkinen in 1999, Shumacher in 1995, Senna in 1991, Prost in 1986. I don't know if they used the numbers that way for Brabham in 1960, Fangio in 1955-57, and Ascari in 1953.

In the early years it was very common, even when the driver in question was the defending champion, for that driver to be given a different number on a race by race basis depending on what the event organisers decided to do. After all, in the first few decades of the existence of the sport, it was really the track owners who called the shots when it came to racing because they had the most control over the finances of the sport: it is also why, when Bernie rose to prominence within FOCA, that he attacked the circuit owners rather than FISA at first.

Anyway, back to the original question; in 1960, Jack Brabham was given No. 18 for the Argentine GP (a race in which everybody has even numbered cars), No. 8 in Monaco (again, a race with only even numbered cars), No. 11 for the Belgian GP (where Phil Hill, who had finished just 4th in the standings the previous year, was given No. 1), No. 16 in France, No. 1 in Britain and No. 2 in the Portuguese and US GP's. As for Ascari in 1953, the numbers he was given in each race were 10 (Argentinian GP), 2 (Dutch GP),10 (Belgian GP),10 (French GP),5 (British GP),1 (German GP),46 (Swizz GP), 4 (Italian GP).

It is worth bearing in mind, therefore, that the usage of No. 1 to signify a defending champion is a later change - it isn't until the 1970's that the change comes about, and even then there were some anomalies (for example, in 1974 Ronnie Peterson was allocated No. 1 even though he had only finished 3rd in the standings and Stewart had retired from the sport the previous year).

[EDIT] Having taken a quick look at ChicaneF1.com, it does seem to confirm that No. 1 is the most successful in terms of total number of victories (163 victories), followed by No. 5 (127 victories) - surprisingly, this means that cars wearing No. 5 are statistically far more successful than the cars wearing No. 2, 3 or 4.

I guess we could go by the number that was used when they clinched the title to make things a little easier. You're right, 5 is a very common number. All these drivers clinched the title with this number. Vettel in 2010, Alonso in 2005, Shumacher in 1994, Mansell in 1992, Piquet in 1983 and 1981, Andretti in 1978, and Fittipaldi in 1974.

[James1978]

Since teams had the same numbers for the season it's been the following numbers winning the championship:

1973 5
1974 5
1975 12
1976 11
1977 11
1978 5
1979 11
1980 27
1981 5
1982 6
1983 5
1984 8
1985 2
1986 1
1987 6
1988 12
1989 2
1990 27
1991 1
1992 5
1993 2
1994 5
1995 1
1996 5
1997 3
1998 8
1999 1
2000 3
2001 1
2002 1
2003 1
2004 1
2005 5
2006 1
2007 6
2008 22
2009 22
2010 5
2011 1

5 does come up there an awful lot!!! Surprisingly 4 and 7 have never won the championship (Though Irvine in 1999 and Prost in 1984 came very close with 4 and 7 respectively).

[DOSBoot]

5 does come up there an awful lot!!! Surprisingly 4 and 7 have never won the championship (Though Irvine in 1999 and Prost in 1984 came very close with 4 and 7 respectively).

Didn't Phil Hill clinch his title with the number 4 at the 1961 Italian GP?

[James1978]

5 does come up there an awful lot!!! Surprisingly 4 and 7 have never won the championship (Though Irvine in 1999 and Prost in 1984 came very close with 4 and 7 respectively).

Didn't Phil Hill clinch his title with the number 4 at the 1961 Italian GP?

I don't know - I was only looking at years when teams had the same numbers for the whole year.

[DOSBoot]

5 does come up there an awful lot!!! Surprisingly 4 and 7 have never won the championship (Though Irvine in 1999 and Prost in 1984 came very close with 4 and 7 respectively).

Didn't Phil Hill clinch his title with the number 4 at the 1961 Italian GP?

I don't know - I was only looking at years when teams had the same numbers for the whole year.

Just looked at some video footage of that race. 2 was the number he used.

[dr-baker]

Wiining Car Number

1 - 135
5 - 109
2 - 66
3 - 47
6 - 43
8 - 41
11 - 36
12 - 36

Includes Indy 500 victories.

[fjackdaw]

Bizarrely, the best numbers to have had seem to be 1, 5, 6, 11, 12, 22 and 27.

No number 4 car has ever won the championship. And number 2 has only won it once. (EDIT: Sorry twice, both times in the 80s).

That means the most likely winners of the championship this year are Vettel, Alonso, Massa, Di Resta, Hulkenberg and De La Rosa!

[fjackdaw]

Actually, Button and Rosberg are in with a shout too, 3 and 8 are pretty decent cars to be in.

Sorry, Lewis, you don't stand a chance.

[DOSBoot]

No number 4 car has ever won the championship. And number 2 has only won it once. (EDIT: Sorry twice, both times in the 80s).

More than that from what from what I recall. Prost in 1993 and 1985, Denny Hulme in 1967, and Phil Hill in 1961. Carlos Rutemann came close to doing it in 1981.

[fjackdaw]

No number 4 car has ever won the championship. And number 2 has only won it once. (EDIT: Sorry twice, both times in the 80s).

More than that from what from what I recall. Prost in 1993 and 1985, Denny Hulme in 1967, and Phil Hill in 1961. Carlos Rutemann came close to doing it in 1981.

Number blindness on my part. 4 is cursed though. Lew is doomed to spend another season lazily ramming into Filipe/Nicole.

[golic_2004]

13 is the cursed one

[TomWazzleshaw]

Fortunantly (or unfortuantly, depending on how you look at it), one M. Schumacher will presumably have car 7 for this year

[Shizuka]

Fortunantly (or unfortuantly, depending on how you look at it), one M. Schumacher will presumably have car 7 for this year

Like he previously had it this year?

[James1978]

I'm thinking of the overall record of car 4, it was bad in the early days of permanent numbers - most of Tyrrell's wins were with car 3, and it had a fair few rejects driving it - Henton, Zunino, Borgudd, Sullivan, Bailey and the likes, and even Alboreto significantly improved after he changed to 3 in 1982. Depailler got its only win under the 1974 - 1995 numbering IIRC! Didn't Bellof and Brundle often swap numbers in 1984/5? Even Streiff lost the Jim Clark Cup to his teammate in 1987!!!

It improved in the late 80s/early 90s as it usually had the lead Tyrrell driver (Alesi, Modena, De Cesaris, Blundell, Salo).

From 1996 - 2006 it was definitely a second drivers' number, IIRC only Coulthard in 2001 outscored his teammate in an 11-year period (except Irvine when Schumacher missed half the season in 1999), Kimi only finished a handful of races in 2002, Ralf had it when he crashed and missed a lot of 2004 (and Monza 2003), and Sato had it when reject of the year in 2005, and Montoya was driving it in 2006 when his career ended!

2007 onwards it's done much better with Kovalainen, Kubica, Raikkonen, Rosberg and Button all outscoring their teammates (though maybe Kimi wouldn't have in '09 if Massa had done the full year)!

So it seems to go in cycles so hope isn't lost for Hamilton this year!!!

[IdeFan]

Since this is F1Rejects, this conversation shouldn't be about success and winning, it should be about lack of success!

With that in mind I have a couple of questions:

What is the lowest number never to take a race victory? (I'm going to guess 13, so what is the lowest number excluding 13?)

Of the currently active F1 numbers (1 - 25, excluding 13) which number has score the least points? (use DNQs and DNPQs as a tiebreaker).

This isn't a quiz, I don't know the answers, I'd genuinely like to know!

[Sunshine_Baby_[IT]]

Of the currently active F1 numbers (1 - 25, excluding 13) which number has score the least points? (use DNQs and DNPQs as a tiebreaker).

This isn't a quiz, I don't know the answers, I'd genuinely like to know!

I don't know the answer, but probably number 21? it has been for many years on cars as Spirit in the early 80s, later on the Dallara from mid 80s to early 90s, on the Forti in mid 90s and later on the Minardi.

[FullMetalJack]

Of the currently active F1 numbers (1 - 25, excluding 13) which number has score the least points? (use DNQs and DNPQs as a tiebreaker).

Probably 24, as that was Minardi's #2 driver, and Martini would have been the one getting all of the points.

[fjackdaw]

Oops, sorry, wrong thread.

[mario]

Of the currently active F1 numbers (1 - 25, excluding 13) which number has score the least points? (use DNQs and DNPQs as a tiebreaker).

Probably 24, as that was Minardi's #2 driver, and Martini would have been the one getting all of the points.

Under the 10-6-4-3-2-1 points system it appears that #25 is slightly less successful (151 points to 158 for car 24) - the statistics are slightly skewed in #24's favour because James Hunt used #24 whilst driving for Hesketh Racing, which accounts for six of the podiums and one of the wins (or about a quarter of the points) attributed to car #24. It also appears to have been reasonably popular in the 1950's - Fangio briefly used #24, and picked up a win in the 1951 Argentine GP with that number - so its earlier success in the early years of F1's history gives it a slight advantage.
Car #25, meanwhile, only has two wins associated with it from Ligier - Depailler in 1979 and Pironi in 1980 - which, coupled to Ligier gradually trailing off in form over the years, partially explains why #25 is fractionally less successful.

[James1978]

Of the currently active F1 numbers (1 - 25, excluding 13) which number has score the least points? (use DNQs and DNPQs as a tiebreaker).

This isn't a quiz, I don't know the answers, I'd genuinely like to know!

I don't know the answer, but probably number 21? it has been for many years on cars as Spirit in the early 80s, later on the Dallara from mid 80s to early 90s, on the Forti in mid 90s and later on the Minardi.

I don't think car 18 has ever won a race?

[DOSBoot]

Since this is F1Rejects, this conversation shouldn't be about success and winning, it should be about lack of success!

Why? There's no rule here stating that we shouldn't talk about success. If I wanted to talk about least successful numbers, I would have made a different thread about it. But I guess you can talk about that stuff here if you want to. I would rather have it in one thread that is relative to the subject, rather than have several different threads all over the site.

[tc3j3r]

Here's a great website for information car numbers (and lots more F1 stats): http://www.chicanef1.com/list.pl?who=n&nc=0 You can see how many races each number has won, how many 2nd to 6th places it has had, who has raced with it, how many laps it has led, its average finishing position and lots more. To answer some of the questions posed here:

Of the currently active F1 numbers (1 - 25, excluding 13) which number has score the least points? (use DNQs and DNPQs as a tiebreaker).

This isn't a quiz, I don't know the answers, I'd genuinely like to know!

I don't know the answer, but probably number 21? it has been for many years on cars as Spirit in the early 80s, later on the Dallara from mid 80s to early 90s, on the Forti in mid 90s and later on the Minardi.

I don't think car 18 has ever won a race?

Wrong, car 18 has in fact won no less than EIGHT races, includiong a few with Fangio, but none since 1971: http://www.chicanef1.com/query.pl?actio ... ssi=1&nc=0

What is the lowest number never to take a race victory? (I'm going to guess 13, so what is the lowest number excluding 13?)

Excluding 13, the lowest number never to have won a race is 29, so all the active numbers have won at least one race. 29 was last used in 1995. Patrese took pole and led for 24 laps with it at the 1981 US West GP, which is the only time it has ever accomplished either of those things. http://www.chicanef1.com/indiv.pl?name=29&type=n

Looking at the unsuccessful numbers 4 and 7: 4 has won 33 races, it one went 19 years without a win from 1978-97! But its fortunes have improved recently: http://www.chicanef1.com/query.pl?actio ... ssi=1&nc=0

7 has won 26 races, it achieved quite a few when Prost came so close to the title with it in 1984, but has only won 2 races in the last 26 years, most recently in 2004. http://www.chicanef1.com/query.pl?actio ... ssi=1&nc=0

[Ferrim]

Bizarrely, the best numbers to have had seem to be 1, 5, 6, 11, 12, 22 and 27.

No number 4 car has ever won the championship. And number 2 has only won it once. (EDIT: Sorry twice, both times in the 80s).

That means the most likely winners of the championship this year are Vettel, Alonso, Massa, Di Resta, Hulkenberg and De La Rosa!

1: no explanation needed.

5 and 6: well, they are low numbers, so a team towards the top will likely use them. The question actually is -what happens with numbers 3 and 4? And the answer, of course, is that Tyrrell had them for over 20 years. Still it's surprising how unsuccessful have they been since 1996: it seems that finishing second in the WCC does not bring you much success.

11 and 12 come from the "fixed numbers" system. IIRC they started in Ferrari in the mid 70s, then when Lauda won the championship, McLaren took them and Hunt won it as well, and they had a tendency to "come back" to winning teams all the time: they went back to McLaren in 1988, for example.

27 is because of Williams being a new entrant in the late 70s and therefore taking big numbers: Jones won the title with it and the numbers went to Ferrari, where they stayed until 1995 and didn't win a single championship... except for 1990, when Prost came to Ferrari with #1 and McLaren raced 27 and 28, resulting in Senna's second championship.

And finally, number 22 shouldn't have won anything, but because of McLaren's disqualification from the 2007 results, and Brawn starting as a new outfit in 2009... it did!

[James1978]

Is 14 is the lowest number (apart from 13), never to have won a race in the "teams keep the same numbers for the full season" era? I had originally thought 18 but 14 seems to supercede it. It was mostly used by teams who only ran with one car up until the early 90s!

Then it was Fondmetal, Jordan before they ever won a race, Sauber, Prost and Arrows in 1996 - 2001, Renault in 2002, then Jaguar/Red Bull most of the time before they were front-runners, Bourdais had it in 2008 (would have thought Vettel should have had it but there you go), and more recently Sutil's Force India.

Bad news - Kobayashi has it this year.

Actually ignore all that - I've just remembered Webber had 14 in 2009. Oops. Didn't realise Red Bull suddenly shot up from 7th to 2nd in the Constructors Chamionship so quickly!! I was getting mixed up with the 9 and 10 they had in 2008. 14 is still a pretty bad number though as the only race winner with it is someone perenially unlucky.

So its probably 18 then.

[Barbazza]

Probably 24, as that was Minardi's #2 driver, and Martini would have been the one getting all of the points.

A-he-HEM!!

[David AGS]

This is a bit 'out of whack' these days

Numbers only changed when the champion wasnt number 1 or so.

This system changed in the 1996 season. Williams were 5-6 for many years, same as Tyrrell 3-4, Brabham 7-8, Arrows 9-10, Lotus 11-12, Ferrari 21-28, Benetton 19-20, Minardi 23-24 etc. I guess McLaren isnt there, as they had 1 or 2 for many years, or they took 7-8 when Brabham went bust.

I like the 'old' idea. The champion gets no.1, the rest can sort it out themselves. It works in V8 Supercars, the CART series was like that, NASCAR, Motogp etc

[IdeFan]

This is a bit 'out of whack' these days

Numbers only changed when the champion wasnt number 1 or so.

This system changed in the 1996 season. Williams were 5-6 for many years, same as Tyrrell 3-4, Brabham 7-8, Arrows 9-10, Lotus 11-12, Ferrari 21-28, Benetton 19-20, Minardi 23-24 etc. I guess McLaren isnt there, as they had 1 or 2 for many years, or they took 7-8 when Brabham went bust.

I like the 'old' idea. The champion gets no.1, the rest can sort it out themselves. It works in V8 Supercars, the CART series was like that, NASCAR, Motogp etc

F1 seems to have lots of rules like this for no good reason, like the "both cars have to look the same" and "no major livery changes during the year" rules.

[tc3j3r]

The question actually is -what happens with numbers 3 and 4? And the answer, of course, is that Tyrrell had them for over 20 years. Still it's surprising how unsuccessful have they been since 1996: it seems that finishing second in the WCC does not bring you much success.

Actually, finishing 2nd in the WCC brings you quite a lot of success, the team that finished 2nd the previous year has gone on to take both the WDC and WCC no less than FOUR times since 1996, but the only time they had 3 & 4 was Schumacher & Ferrari in 2000. In 1996, Hill and Williams took both titles having finished 2nd in 95, but had numbers 5 & 6 because Schumacher moved to Ferrari as WDC taking the #1 with him, so Bennetton and Williams got pushed down the number list. In 2007, Raikkonen and Ferrari took both titles having finished 2nd in 06, but had numbers 5 & 6 because Alonso had moved to McLaren as WDC taking the #1 with him, so Renault and Ferrari got pushed down the number list. And finally, in 2010, Vettel and Red Bull took both titles having finished 2nd in 09, but had numbers 5 & 6 because Button had moved to McLaren as WDC taking the #1 with him, so Mercedes and Red Bull got pushed down the number list. Interestingly, in all 3 cases, the team the reigning WDC joined had finished 3rd in the WDC the previous year, and the team that had won the WDC and WCC but got pushed down to numbers 3 & 4 because of the loss of their world champion (Bennetton in 96, Renault in 07, Mercedes in 10) failed to win a single race!

However, funnily enough, on the other occasion when car 3 won the WDC, 1997, Villenueve won it for Williams who hadn't finished 2nd in the WDC the previous year, they'd won it, but got pushed down to numbers 3 & 4 because the reigning WDC Hill took the #1 with him to Arrows!

[James1978]

Also without Spygate, McLaren would have had 3 and 4 in 2008. (Though Hamilton would most likely have had car 3 being the incumbent).

[Shadaza]

This is a bit 'out of whack' these days

Numbers only changed when the champion wasnt number 1 or so.

This system changed in the 1996 season. Williams were 5-6 for many years, same as Tyrrell 3-4, Brabham 7-8, Arrows 9-10, Lotus 11-12, Ferrari 21-28, Benetton 19-20, Minardi 23-24 etc. I guess McLaren isnt there, as they had 1 or 2 for many years, or they took 7-8 when Brabham went bust.

I like the 'old' idea. The champion gets no.1, the rest can sort it out themselves. It works in V8 Supercars, the CART series was like that, NASCAR, Motogp etc

F1 seems to have lots of rules like this for no good reason, like the "both cars have to look the same" and "no major livery changes during the year" rules.

I actually like these rules, for the casual observer it is much easier to recognise teams by consistent colours. Mind if the cars didn't have to look the same I bet most teams would keep both cars looking the same way regardless. In Indycar, last season was the first full season I watched and KV cars stood out because of their uniform, I liked that. As for numbers, I like the idea the lower the number the "better" the team as if they "earnt" their numbers.

On the other hand, the Blue liveried BAR looked great!!!!

[dinizintheoven]

Actually ignore all that - I've just remembered Webber had 14 in 2009. Oops. Didn't realise Red Bull suddenly shot up from 7th to 2nd in the Constructors Chamionship so quickly!! I was getting mixed up with the 9 and 10 they had in 2008. 14 is still a pretty bad number though as the only race winner with it is someone perenially unlucky.
So its probably 18 then.

It could have been so different. If Brawn GP had been able to keep the numbers assigned to Honda for 2009, car number 18 would have blitzed the first half of the season. 19 would have had a couple of wins too, but with that being a Benetton number for so long in the days when teams like Osella and AGS ended up with car 18 (and for a while there wasn't one on the grid at all), that was nothing new. And how about if Schumi and Rubens had taken each other off by accident at Indianapolis in that farce of a 2005 race, or if Jaguar had come up with a miraculously brilliant car in 2001...

[WeirdKerr]

0 is a number also.....

3 wins in 1993 and 5 in 1994......

8 wins from 33 starts

[BabyG]

Very interesting topic - I have always wondered what the answer is!

Any chance of a graph showing number of victories for all car numbers?

[Ferrim]

And how about if Schumi and Rubens had taken each other off by accident at Indianapolis in that farce of a 2005 race,

The thing is, they came agonishingly close to it.

It would have been so bathplugging epic (and rejectful as well) that... it couldn't happen.