Formula 1
F1 fans vote Verstappen most popular driver, McLaren named favourite team
Max Verstappen has been voted as Formula 1's most popular driver, according to the biggest-ever Global Survey commissioned by Motorsport Network in partnership with F1 and Nielsen Sports.
Luke Smith
Edited: Oct 27, 2021, 7:21 PM
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Verstappen is currently going head-to-head with Lewis Hamilton for the drivers' championship, but has already displaced the Mercedes racer as the favourite driver among fans.
The results of the Global Survey were released on Thursday ahead of the United States Grand Prix after responses from more than 167,000 fans in 187 different countries.
Verstappen was voted by 14.4% of fans as their favourite driver, and ranked in the top three drivers among one-third of F1 fans.
Verstappen's rise in popularity had been noted in the 2017 report, but his upward trend continued in 2021, enjoying a sizeable amount of support in the Netherlands.
But Verstappen's popularity proved to be global as he ranked highly in the United States and Japan, showing his broad appeal.
Verstappen also scored highly among fans in the 35-54 age group, showing the 24-year-old's popularity was not exclusive to a younger audience.
Lando Norris finished second in the vote as 13.7% of fans voted him as their favourite driver, while over 40% of fans placed him in their top three.
Lando Norris, McLaren MCL35M, Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB16B
Photo by: Charles Coates / Motorsport Images
The McLaren driver enjoyed unrivalled popularity among female fans, featuring in 57% of their top three driver votes, and comfortably stood out as the favourite driver of fans 24 and younger.
After being voted as the favourite driver in the 2017 Global Survey, reigning world champion Hamilton has dropped to third for 2021, gaining 12.5% of the vote. He remains the #1 driver in the United Kingdom.
Norris helped McLaren win the vote as fans' favourite team, with its on-track revival also being reflected in a significant upswing in popularity as its vote share almost doubled from 15.8% in 2017 to 29.5% in 2021.
Norris and teammate Daniel Ricciardo - who finished fourth in the driver vote - helped McLaren rank #1 with 40% of fans in the 16-24 age group. McLaren also topped the vote in the UK, US, Australia, Canada and Brazil, as well as ranking first in Europe, the Americas, Middle East and Africa.
Red Bull ranked second in the vote with 19.7%, but was the most popular team with fans over the age of 45. Red Bull finished ahead of Ferrari, which fell from being F1 fans' favourite team in 2017 to third in the 2021 vote, sitting on 17.9%, while Mercedes dropped to fourth on 11.9%.
You can read the full findings of the 2021 F1 Global Survey here.
F1 Global Survey 2021 - Top 10 Favourite Drivers
- Max Verstappen - 14.4%
- Lando Norris - 13.7%
- Lewis Hamilton - 12.5%
- Daniel Ricciardo - 10.2%
- Sebastian Vettel - 9%
- Charles Leclerc - 7.4%
- Fernando Alonso - 7.3%
- Kimi Raikkonen - 5.4%
- George Russell - 4%
- Pierre Gasly - 2.9%
F1 Global Survey 2021 - Top 5 Favourite Teams
- McLaren 29.5%
- Red Bull 19.7%
- Ferrari 17.9%
- Mercedes 11.9%
- Alpine 3.1%
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