What's motorsport's greatest combination?

To celebrate the 60th anniversary of AUTOSPORT's sister publication, Motorsport News, a poll was launched to find the greatest motorsport combination.

A shortlist of 60 duos, ranging from Jim Clark and Colin Chapman to Colin McRae and the Subaru Impreza, via Tom Kristensen and Le Mans, was created.

The votes have now been collated. Here's how the votes stacked up.

25. RONNIE PETERSON AND THE LOTUS 72

There's no doubt Jackie Stewart was a worthy world champion in 1973, taking the tricky Tyrrell 006 to five wins, but it's hard to argue Peterson and the Lotus 72 weren't the fastest combination.

Nine poles from the 15 races underlined the Swede's pace, but poor reliability limited him to third in the standings despite four victories.

Jochen Rindt and Emerson Fittipaldi took world titles with the DFV-engined 72, but it is Peterson pressing on at Woodcote that provides the machine's iconic image.

He also managed to win three races in 1974, the ageing car's fifth season.

24. GRAHAM HILL AND MONACO

Before Ayrton Senna took his record, Hill's five wins around the principality made him Mr Monaco.

Hill made his F1 debut on the famous street circuit and soon proved capable of finding a rhythm there. His stamina and ability to avoid errors proved the perfect mix around the punishing venue, and he scored 20 per cent of his career F1 points there.

His 1965 win was probably his greatest, charging back after being forced off by a backmarker.

His last GP win came in 1969, but - less fittingly - his final Monaco appearance ended with him failing to qualify as his powers had waned.

23. STIRLING MOSS AND THE MERCEDES-BENZ 300SLR

Applying the current World Endurance Championship points system to the 1955 season, Moss would have been world sportscar champion in the 300SLR.

Moss won the Mille Miglia, Targa Florio and Dundrod Tourist Trophy, each time ahead of team-mate Juan Manuel Fangio, and the duo led at Le Mans before Mercedes pulled out due to Pierre Levegh's accident.

"You never had a concern about it breaking, things never came off, so you were willing to push it," says Moss.

"You felt there was no car that deserved to beat it. It was a very fast car."

22. MARTINI AND LANCIA

We don't really go in for rally memorabilia, but this one couldn't be missed. The 20 euros were handed over and on went the navy blue ski hat.

Add Aviators and you became Markku Alen; Wayfarers, Henri Toivonen. The hat has three stripes and two words: red, white, blue, Martini and Racing.

The lines on Lancia's 037 and Deltas of all flavours, from the S4 to the HF 4WD, were all accentuated by world rallying's most iconic and evocative livery: the Martini cars, which also appeared in Group C and Formula 1.

The combination usually culminated in a cocktail of Martini and Mumm at the finish.

21. DEREK BELL AND JACKY ICKX

The powerhouse of sportscar racing from the mid-1970s and for another decade, Briton Derek Bell and Belgian Jacky Ickx first paired up to race a Mirage in 1975 and won at Le Mans on their maiden 24-hour event together.

Bell had been racing with Alfa Romeo in 1975 but was free to chase other options for Le Mans, which was not part of the world championship for makes. Ickx switched over from his part-season with the Lotus F1 team.

It wasn't until the factory Porsche team persuaded Ickx out of retirement by showing him the blueprints of its Group C 956 that the partnership was rekindled.

The duo won Le Mans in 1981 in 1982. Porsche often split the pair for championship races, but their special blend flourished at La Sarthe.

20. PEDRO RODRIGUEZ AND THE PORSCHE 917

The greatest exponent of one of sportscar racing's finest machines, Rodriguez scored eight of the 917's 15 world sportscar victories.

His drive to win by five laps, after falling a lap behind, in atrocious conditions at Brands Hatch in 1970 is one of the greatest wet weather performances of all time.

There were other highlights, including defeating the works Ferraris at Monza in 1970 and lapping the old Spa 11 seconds quicker than that year's F1 fastest lap during the 1000Km.

19. NIGEL MANSELL AND THE BRITISH GP

Few drivers could command a race like Mansell on home ground at Silverstone or Brands Hatch.

Between 1986-1992, Mansell won the British GP four times and finished second twice, producing some of the most memorable F1 moments along the way - the infamous dummy on Nelson Piquet for the win in '87 anybody?

But what was the key to it all?

"There's no race like the British GP," said Mansell. "The fans make it - they are so knowledgeable and passionate and as a driver you feed off that.

"I used to find a few tenths from them. I wrung the neck of whatever car I had for them and they loved watching it.

18. FLEETWOOD MAC AND THE BBC'S GRAND PRIX

Although recorded in 1976, Fleetwood Mac's 11th studio album, Rumours, wasn't released until 1977 - just a year before the British Broadcasting Corporation decided to introduce highlights of each race through the Grand Prix programme.

From the opening strains of a section taken from the middle of The Chain (3m05s into the track), the deep bass notes rise to a crescendo.

When the BBC lost the coverage in 1997 the tune disappeared until the it reacquired the rights in 2009 - and the move was so popular that the song re-entered the top 100 in the music charts thanks to downloads.

It is still one of the most recognisable theme tunes on television.

17. FORMULA FORD AND BRANDS HATCH

Ray Allen was a trailblazer when he won the first ever Formula Ford race at Brands Hatch on July 2, 1967.

The category was conceived by Brands Hatch's John Webb and Motor Racing Stables boss Geoff Clarke. Clarke wanted a cut-price racer that his racing
school could use.

Webb agreed it was a good plan and the formula was devised. It was after the initial 1500cc Cortina GT engine was replaced with the 1600cc Kent engine - to follow the evolution of the road car range - that the category really took hold.

Brands Hatch's Formula Ford Festival - held at the Kent track since 1976 - means that it can rightly claim to be the home of the unofficial Formula Ford world cup.

16. FORMULA 1 AND MONZA

F1 is about speed, and nowhere is that single factor more important than Monza.

Nicknamed Il tempio della velocita (The temple of speed), Monza is the most extreme test on the F1 calendar.

Juan Pablo Montoya recorded the fastest speed achieved in an F1 race when he hit 231.52mph in his McLaren-Mercedes in 2005.

Monza has held more world championship F1 races than any other circuit, only missing out on the Italian GP in 1980 to Imola, and the tifosi lend the race a unique atmosphere.

15. FORD ESCORT MK2 AND RALLYING

Forest arches, dished wheel, whiney ZF gearbox and a full-bore BDA.

Ford's Mk2 Escort arrived in rallying in 1975 and has been standing hairs up on
the backs of necks ever since.

Take your pick from Roger Clark to Ari Vatanen, Steve Bannister to Nick Elliott, the name, the generation doesn't matter - the angle of attack will be just the same: sideways.

The RS1600's successor took Ford to another level and delivered global success, while appealing to fans and world champions in equal measure.

Forty years on, there's still no finer sight than a well-wheeled one on the limit.

14. PETER BROCK AND BATHURST

The impact that Peter Brock had on Australian motorsport is little known on this side of the world, but he is adored at home.

He won multiple titles, but it was his successes at Bathurst that cemented his place as a fan favourite.

Close friend and former colleague Alan Gow explains: "Brocky was the most gifted driver I have ever seen - and he was one of the first to really realise how important the fans were.

"It wasn't unusual to see him standing out the back of the garage at 2000hrs, signing autographs and keeping the spectators happy. He was that kind of guy."

13. JACKIE STEWART AND KEN TYRRELL

Following his third and final F1 crown in 1973, Sir Jackie Stewart revealed why he thrived with the Tyrrell team.

Stewart, who took all three of his world titles and 25 GP wins for Ken Tyrrell's squad (in Matra, March and Tyrrell chassis), said: "It was the most remarkable group of people, like a family.

"I always had total confidence in Ken's cars. Even when we ran a new car.

"I set a new lap record on one car's first test. I could always push as I had confidence in the people who built the cars."

12. GILLES VILLENEUVE AND FERRARI

Ferrari wasn't averse to taking a punt on drivers: Niki Lauda had scored a sum total of two championship points before walking through the gates at Maranello.

But the world was still stunned when Enzo Ferrari plumped for Gilles Villeneuve after the French-Canadian's single F1 outing with McLaren at the British GP.

The spirit was clear for everyone to see from his time in Formula Atlantic - including beating the imported F1 stars at Trois-Rivieres in 1976.

And the passion of Ferrari and the never-give-up attitude of Villeneuve made them a perfect blend. He gave everything for the firm, and the fans loved him for it.

His death at the Belgian GP in 1982 rocked the sport.

11. FRANK WILLIAMS AND PATRICK HEAD

British motorsport would be a poorer place had Patrick Head continued to build boats.

Head began at Lola, meeting Sir Frank Williams as a rival constructor during the early 1970s.

Head quit the sport to focus on marine craft, before Williams tempted him back in 1976.

Williams Grand Prix Engineering was born and nearly 40 years later is a pillar
of British engineering and innovation.

Williams boasts 16 F1 world titles and its Advanced Engineering division supplies components to competition cars across the world.

10. FORD AND COSWORTH

This could almost have been an entry for Lotus and Cosworth as both founders of the engineering company, Mike Costin and Keith Duckworth, were former Lotus employees.

Colin Chapman's firm was also instrumental in the deal that got Ford involved in the development of the Cosworth DFV, F1's most successful engine.

The Double Four Valve three-litre V8 won its first world championship GP in 1967 in a Lotus 49 and its last - the 155th success - in 1983, in Michele Alboreto's Tyrrell 011.

Variants of the DFV were also successful in sportscars and Indycar racing, but the Ford-Cosworth partnership was about far more than its most famous product.

In rallying, the BDA engine for the Escort started a long line of powerplants that would help the Blue Oval stay at the sport's forefront.

There were also many other collaborations in junior single-seaters and tin-tops, perhaps most famously the Ford Sierra RS Cosworth and RS500 cars, which dominated British Touring Cars in the late-1980s.

In short, there are few branches of the sport that haven't been touched - or dominated - by the Ford-Cosworth relationship.

9. ALAN GOW AND BRITISH TOURING CARS

Andy Rouse was impressed when he met Alan Gow in the mid-1980s.

Gow was working alongside Peter Brock in Australia and the pair travelled to Rouse's Coventry workshops to purchase a couple of ex-Kaliber Ford Sierra Cosworths to take back Down Under.

Rouse said that if ever Gow wanted a job in the UK, he should get in touch with him.

Gow landed on his doorstep a few years later and got a job. So he immediately had one foot in the door of the British Touring Car Championship when he arrived in the UK in 1990.

The Touring Car Association (TOCA) was created to oversee the switch to the new two-litre formula, and Super Touring would go on to become the dominant force around the world. Gow was at the helm when the BTCC could boast nine manufacturer teams in 1995.

Gow sold the rights to the series to promotions firm Octagon at the end of 2000 but then bought it back when the American firm reversed out of the BTCC in 2003.

He has since rebuilt the category with the current NGTC regulations and the series has more than 30 cars this year.

8. AYRTON SENNA AND THE WET

Monaco Grand Prix, Monte Carlo, June 3, 1984: In a torrential downpour, Senna hauls the bulky Toleman through the streets faster than anyone else (apart from, at times, Stefan Bellof's Tyrrell).

He is closing on leader Alain Prost's McLaren when the race is ended prematurely.

Portuguese Grand Prix, Estoril, April 21, 1985: Senna takes his first ever pole position by nearly half a second from Prost's McLaren.

By the end of 67 sodden laps, Senna is one minute in front of Michele Alboreto's Ferrari - the only other car on the lead lap.

Canadian Grand Prix, Montreal, June 18, 1989: As soon as day dawns
in mixed conditions, there is always one favourite.

Riccardo Patrese's Williams leads early on, but as soon as Senna - who has stopped for wet tyres at the right time - gets through on lap 34, he is in another league.

Engine failure with two laps to go leaves him seventh.

Australian Grand Prix, Adelaide, November 3, 1991: The last round of the championship - already secured by Senna - is held in a thunderstorm and would go on to hold the record for being the shortest GP in history.

Only 16 of the scheduled 81 laps are run. Senna holds sway from Nigel Mansell's Williams, and the Englishman eventually goes off but is classified behind the Brazilian.

European Grand Prix, Donington Park, April 11, 1993: The McLaren-Ford is not a match for Prost's and Damon Hill's Williams-Renaults and only rain can save Senna.

England in April delivers, and Senna slices from fifth on the grid to lead in just a lap. He wins by 1m23s.

7. COLIN MCRAE AND THE SUBARU IMPREZA

Thirty miles. That's how far the convoy stretched up the M40 when 1086 Subaru fans got together to remember their man and their car. Colin McRae and Subaru's Impreza.

The burble of a flat-four 'Boxer' was McRae's career soundtrack.

The world championship came in 1995, but arguably the McRae-Impreza partnership was at its most potent a couple of years on when the '555' made way for the stunning World Rally Car version.

Circumstances ultimately denied this partnership the silverware it really deserved.

But '95 delivered enough memories, be they a surprising, slow-speed metronomic approach deployed to dominate the Motu Road stage in New Zealand, the drama of Subaru top brass almost being skittled as they tried to slow McRae in Spain, or the raw emotion of the RAC a few weeks later.

All magic moments.

6. SEBASTIEN LOEB AND CITROEN

Sebastien Loeb's not a boy for blue. He tried it for a year and it just wasn't right.

In his 2006 season as a 'privateer' he still won eight rallies and the championship, but Loeb's a Citroen man through and through. He was born to wear, and win, in red.

Loeb started the 2003 season as Citroen's third driver alongside world rallying royalty Colin McRae and Carlos Sainz. By the middle of that year, there was a clear shift as the Parisians' emphasis drifted from the old guard to the modest, but magnificently talented, Loeb.

He missed the title in his first full year, but only by a point from Petter Solberg. That was the last thing he missed.

From then on he turned rally wins into titles and nine-tenths of a decade of total WRC dominance.

He took Citroen from the Xsara to the C4 to the DS 3 without even the hint of a dip in form as each new car came out of its box.

Loeb built the team around him with a single aim and solid - yet often unseen - determination and commitment. The result was a set of stats unlikely to ever be bettered.

5. TOM KRISTENSEN AND LE MANS

Nobody expected a random phone call in 1997 to produce one of modern motorsport's greats.

Tom Kristensen only knew about his first Le Mans 24 Hours drive a week before the race. He joined Team Joest, shattered the lap record and won on his first attempt.

That began Kristensen's 18-year love affair with Le Mans.

His stats are unbelievable, and possibly unbeatable - nine wins from 18 starts, he led at least a lap of every one of those races bar one, and he was never off the podium in the Le Mans he finished.

"I never dreamt of the success at Le Mans I had," he says. "Now that I'm retired, Le Mans will still be a big part of my life.

"I'll follow it as long as I can, and I enjoyed watching it this year, albeit with a
little less adrenaline, but that makes it no less interesting to me."

4. MURRAY WALKER AND A MICROPHONE

Murray Walker did more to increase the popularity of F1 than almost anybody else.

Having been the voice of motorsport on the BBC - and particularly his beloved motorcycle racing - through the 1960s and 1970s, it wasn't until the BBC decided to create dedicated highlights programme Grand Prix that Murray became known to a wider audience.

He quickly went on to become famous throughout the country.

He was joined after two seasons in the commentary box by 1976 world champion James Hunt, who Walker initially suspected was after the main role.

They had a volatile relationship to begin with but they grew to work professionally together and formed a well-liked double act through until Hunt's death of a heart attack in 1993.

Walker, who went to ITV when F1 switched channels, stood down in 2001 but continued to work for the BBC when it regained the rights to cover F1 in 2009.

Now 91, Murray is also involved in a new series with Suzi Perry called F1 Rewind.

He was known for his 'Murrayisms' when trying to convey the action to the fans: "I was just so keen to let the public know what was happening, that I would just get my words muddled up or wrong.

"But it was all down to the passion that I wanted to impart - and maybe sometimes there is a slip of the tongue.

"The media only talk about the times that you get things wrong, but they never talk about the times you get it right.

"But some gave people a laugh - and you mustn't take yourself so seriously."

3. JIM CLARK AND COLIN CHAPMAN

F1, the Indianapolis 500, the British Saloon Car Championship and the Tasman series. Design genius Colin Chapman and Jim Clark, one of the greatest racing drivers of all time, won them all together.

Lotus founder Chapman was far more combative than the shy and indecisive Clark, but they developed an understanding rarely seen at the sport's pinnacle.

As Cedric Selzer, who looked after Clark's Lotus 25 during his dominant 1963 F1 season, said in a 2012 interview: "They were completely different, but worked very well together."

In the early days, Clark's technical understanding was limited, which could make improving his cars tricky, but Chapman was able to interpret what his lead driver was saying.

As Clark's experience grew, so did his acumen, and the combination was rarely unable to sort a car, the Lotus 30 and 40 sportscars probably being the notable exceptions.

Clark's incredible feel and lightness of touch would have served him well in most teams, particularly during the underpowered 1.5-litre 1961-'65 F1 era, but with Lotus it was almost essential.

Chapman's quest for lightness meant his cars - especially in the early days - were fragile. Even in Clark's careful hands, reliability issues cost the 1962 and '64 world titles.

With the brand new 49 in 1967, team-mate Graham Hill scored poles and fastest laps, but an appalling finishing record meant no wins. Clark took four victories.

Would he have stayed at Lotus had he survived the Hockenheim F2 crash?

There had been signs that Clark was considering other pastures. He'd raced a Holman-Moody NASCAR and driven a Vollstedt Indycar, but it seems unlikely he would have raced for anyone else in F1, especially as the improved 49 would almost certainly have taken him to a third world crown in 1968.

2. PETER FALDING AND COVENTRY STADIUM

Peter Falding certainly had a liking for the Coventry circuit. Falding won all four of his BriSCA F1 world titles at the Midlands oval.

His first came in 1986 when he became the youngest ever winner of the world final aged just 21, a record that still stands to this day.

"I was in the right place at the right time for that race," says Falding. "Stuart Smith was leading and he got taken out, but he was a driver I wanted to be like, so it was good to beat him.

"I didn't know I was the youngest champion until I was told after the race, so the emotion of it didn't affect my driving."

The world final returned to Coventry in 1989, but this time Falding was narrowly beaten into second place by Ray Tyldesley.

It would be 1993 before the title race returned to the Coventry shale and Falding picked up his second world trophy: "I think that was my best race.

"I had a good battle with John Lund, then I put Nigel Whorton in the fence, so it wasn't an easy win."

For a few years after that race, Falding raced in the Eurocar and ASCAR series and cut back his efforts in BriSCA F1.

It wasn't until the early 2000s that he returned to the short ovals on a regular basis.

By that time Coventry was host to Stock Car's biggest race of the year on a more regular basis, enabling Falding to post back-to-back title wins in 2003 and '04.

"I could have won the title at other tracks, but I didn't have the luck," says Falding.

"I had a good set-up around Coventry, but you need the luck as well. I would say two of my wins were lucky and two were deserved."

1. MICHAEL SCHUMACHER AND ROSS BRAWN

Maybe once in a generation, a combination comes along that pushes
an area of the sport to a new plane. Ross Brawn and Michael Schumacher did that.

Brawn began his motor racing career with March in 1976 and then joined the Williams team in 1978, rising through the ranks to become an aerodynamicist.

He went through Team Haas Lola to Arrows and then on to Tom Walkinshaw Racing - which would have a role in running the Benetton F1 team's engineering department in 1991. So Brawn had a foot in both the World Sports Car Championship and Formula 1 - both of which would prove crucial to Schumacher's future.

That is where Brawn got a close-up look at the up-and-coming German driver, who was piloting a Mercedes-Benz in Group C.

Schumacher was part of the Mercedes Junior team - which also comprised Heinz-Harald Frentzen and Karl Wendlinger - and although Schumacher only won one Group C race at the end of 1991, he had turned heads.

Schumacher and Mercedes were up against what was probably the ultimate expression of a Group C car, the Jaguar XJR-14, which had been penned by Brawn.

Speaking to James Allen for his book Michael Schumacher, the Edge of Greatness, Brawn said: "We were racing against Michael, Frentzen and Wendlinger.

"All of them went on to F1 - but every time Michael got in to the Sauber Mercedes he was quicker and, as it was a fuel economy formula, he also went further on a tank of fuel than then others. He was faster, but he was using less fuel.

"The only time that Mercedes challenged us was when Michael was driving.

Schumacher and Brawn made F1 history together © LAT

"They had a policy of rotating drivers, whereas we favoured the stronger driver in our team. When we prepared for the race, we always had to build in a Michael factor.

"I didn't know him as a person then, only as a very fast driver."

After Schumacher's stunning qualifying effort in the Belgian GP in 1991, in which he put the Jordan 191 seventh on the grid, Walkinshaw and Brawn knew they had to act quickly to snaffle the German's signature ahead of an impending Mercedes arrival in F1.

They managed it too, and so Brawn got his chance to work with Schumacher first hand.

It was a partnership that would go on to dominate F1 for more than a decade.

The first two titles came with Benetton in 1994 and 1995 but Schumacher's defection to Ferrari in 1996 came as something of a shock for Brawn.

However, Schumacher knew that Brawn and designer Rory Byrne were crucial for him to maintain his winning streak.

Having switched to Ferrari to try to galvanise the Italian giant and help it back to the very top, Schumacher soon realised that there were many building blocks that needed putting in place - and the Englishman and the South African were two vital parts of that.

Brawn says: "It was a pretty brave decision he took to go to Ferrari because he didn't know the structure there.

"He was a bit frustrated that he couldn't see what steps were going to be taken to put the team on the right track.

The pair won five straight F1 titles together at the start of the noughties © LAT

"On the technical side he didn't feel that there was the planning or foresight to go into the next few years, which he was used to at Benetton. He realised that it was something that needed strengthening."

And it worked. It took three years for Schumacher to claim another title after Brawn had joined him in time for the start of the 1997 season - and that included a broken leg at the 1999 British Grand Prix when he had a brake problem on the opening lap.

But from then on, they were on top of the world. Five-straight world championships from 2000 until 2004 helped Schumacher to win more grands prix than anyone else in history.

He triumphed 91 times in total across his career, a benchmark that eclipsed Alain Prost's record by a whopping 40 races.

But it was more than just the stats that helped the duo leave such a mark on the sport.

It was the method in which they worked together that made them stand head and shoulders above any other combination.

One of the prime examples of their partnership was at the Hungarian Grand Prix in 1998.

After McLaren held a 1-2 off the start, Schumacher and Brawn only had one option - to swap to a three-stop strategy and run every lap like it was a qualifier.

Only a driver of Schumacher's skill could have made it work, and he did, beating David Coulthard by nearly 10 seconds.

It was a signature performance and one that underlined the skill of the combination.

And that is just one instance from so many that have led the readership of Motorsport News to vote Schumacher and Brawn as the greatest motorsport combination of all time.

For more special features, including interviews, track tests and great races through the decades, read the Motorsport News Celebration issue, available now.