Who is the greatest of all time?

Who is the greatest? That's a question asked by fans across all sorts of sports and pursuits. Some say it's impossible to answer, but that rather misses the point. Engaged enthusiasts will always want to have the debate. Even if you take the view that no objective result is possible, it's an excuse to revisit the top names in a given field, revel in the finest of their performances, and sometimes it can throw up interesting observations or discoveries.

So what do we mean by 'the greatest'. It certainly is not as straightforward as 'the best'. Due to human progress and technological advancements, the best racing car and driver will be around now. Each generation builds on the knowledge and experiences of the past, so it would be concerning if there wasn't improvement.

Snooker and athletics, where the technological element is relatively small, are prime examples of this. Usain Bolt is indisputably the fastest human runner over 100 metres. But are his record of 9.58 seconds and eight Olympic gold medals greater achievements than, for example, Jesse Owen's 10.2s and four golds at the 1936 Berlin games?

To answer that sort of question, you have to judge the contestants in the context of their time. What opposition did they have? What challenges did they face? Did they change the game in some way? Plenty of snooker players are now better than Steve Davis at his peak, but the level of the game is where it is partly because of the professionalism he brought to it in the 1980s. It was demonstrably different after his arrival.

The question is even tougher in motorsport because there is the significant technological aspect of the cars, which have changed hugely over the years since Autosport was launched in August 1950.

You could argue that what the driver is like out of the car - how they are with the media or how much charisma they have - should also be factored in, but we are talking about the greatest driver, not motorsport personality. Those elements are only included here when they are directly relevant to the on-track performance, though it is clear that such factors can heavily influence who fans' favourites are.

For the purposes of this debate, there will be a bias towards Formula 1. While there have been plenty of great drivers outside of the world championship (also inaugurated in 1950), it has for the most part been befitting of its title: the pinnacle of motorsport.

There is another reason to take this approach. One criticism of modern racing drivers is that they are less versatile than their predecessors, but this is really a function of the increasing specialisation and professionalism of the sport. In the 1950s and 1960s many of the same drivers did F1, sportscars, touring cars etc. If Stirling Moss could beat Roy Salvadori in an F1 car, it probably shouldn't be a surprise that he could beat him in a GT.

If versatility was factored in more strongly, the greatest driver would probably have to be Moss

Now there are many more professional drivers, and most top-level championships have drivers that could have, should have or nearly got to F1. They then specialise in their own areas, making it difficult for others - however good - to simply drop in and beat them. The DTM careers of ex-F1 drivers such as Jean Alesi, Mika Hakkinen and David Coulthard demonstrate the high level of these specialists.

Holding a lack of versatility against modern drivers would mean not judging them in the context of their time. Modern F1 is so involving and intense that there is little scope to do anything else. Fernando Alonso would surely not have taken on the Indianapolis 500 and his Toyota sportscar programme if he had been in the cut-and-thrust of an F1 title fight. His performances elsewhere, however, show that modern drivers can adapt when the opportunity presents itself.

If versatility was factored in more strongly, the greatest driver would probably have to be Moss. American legend Mario Andretti and sportscar ace Jacky Ickx could make strong claims to have been more versatile, but the level of advantage Moss displayed - clearly the best in endurance racing during the 1950s, and the benchmark in F1 after Juan Manuel Fangio's retirement, not to mention success in touring cars and even rallying - across the various disciplines would make him the greatest. But we want to make the argument harder than that...

The basic criteria

Before comparing across eras, it's an easier task to select the standout drivers of their generation. These are the competitors who not only racked up impressive numbers (primarily in the wins department) but who were regarded by many of their peers as the benchmark.

Starting from 1950, that gives us a list of Fangio, Moss, Jim Clark, Jackie Stewart, Niki Lauda, Alain Prost, Ayrton Senna, Michael Schumacher and Lewis Hamilton. To those could be added Alberto Ascari, Gilles Villeneuve and Alonso, but we will come to those later. Drivers who were cut down before reaching their peak, such as Stefan Bellof, can't reasonably be assessed for this. As great as a driver's potential could have been, it can't trump real records and achievements.

There are some basic criteria to assess drivers. Speed is obvious, as are wet-weather prowess and racecraft. How drivers motivate teams and become key elements within them is also relevant here.

On pure pace, perhaps best exemplified by qualifying, the leading contenders from our list would probably be Clark, Villeneuve and Senna. All three dominated their team-mates and produced performances - Clark at the Nurburgring in 1967, Villeneuve in Monaco in 1981, Senna around the same streets seven years later - among the most legendary in motorsport history.

But none of the top drivers lack pace; pure speed is rarely the thing that differentiates the great from the very good. And the increasing importance of qualifying, as downforce has made overtaking harder, has also changed the emphasis on when a driver pulled out their best performance.

Fangio knew he only had to be near the front of the grid, which in those days could be three or four cars wide, and Moss (and other drivers of the 1950s and 1960s) often matched or beat his practice times in the races.

Stewart and Prost also sometimes sacrificed part of qualifying to focus on race set-up, perhaps most famously at the 1969 Italian GP and 1990 Mexican GP - which Prost chose as the race of his life - respectively. Prost scored 41 fastest laps to arch-rival Senna's 19, indicating different priorities, though it would be a diehard Prost fan who would argue that Senna didn't usually have an edge on sheer speed.

The only driver that might miss out slightly on this criteria could be Lauda in that he was rarely regarded as the outright fastest of his era, and admitted to not having the ultimate speed when paired with Prost at McLaren in 1984-85.

One of Prost's weaknesses in this company has to be his record in the rain. He did score successes in the wet, but there's no doubt that Senna had his measure in slippery conditions. Clark, Stewart, Senna, Schumacher and Hamilton score best on this factor, though Moss's wet-weather prowess outside of the world championship (he started surprisingly few points-scoring wet races) indicate he should be in this group too.

PLUS: Sir Stirling Moss' 10 greatest drives

Clark has been criticised for not being as strong in wheel-to-wheel combat and there were errors, such as crashing while fighting Dan Gurney for the lead in the 1965 Race of Champions

The importance of racecraft and managing races has changed over the years. In the 1950s very few drivers would have considered blocking their opposition - plus downforce and 'dirty air' had yet to arrive - so if a driver was quicker they normally found a way by.

As cars got bigger, faster and more downforce-reliant, overtaking became more and more challenging. The extensive use of blue flags to get backmarkers out of the way and the advent of DRS in the modern era have changed things again, but there is still scope for drivers to make a difference, as Hamilton has shown consistently against Sebastian Vettel since 2017.

Within their own eras, most of our selected group score highly on racecraft. Clark has been criticised for not being as strong in wheel-to-wheel combat and there were errors, such as crashing while fighting Dan Gurney for the lead in the 1965 Race of Champions, but often he had races won without having to battle.

The abilities of Lauda and Prost to come through the field, Senna's ruthlessness in traffic, and Schumacher's ability to read a race and maximise all possibilities demonstrate that they were all masters of the art.

Bubbling under

Many other names come to mind when discussing the greatest. Jochen Rindt and Ronnie Peterson are often among those mentioned when the fastest drivers are talked about, but it's hard to argue that either was as complete as Stewart or Lauda.

Nigel Mansell took the fight to Prost and Senna more consistently than any other driver, but usually required a technical edge to do so. It's hard to imagine Prost, Senna or anyone else driving a Williams FW14B faster around Silverstone than Mansell, and the Briton could perhaps be the greatest overtaker, but overall he was the third-best driver of a fine era.

Harder to place are Ascari, Villeneuve and Alonso. Ascari was arguably even faster than Fangio, if less polished. Each knew the other was their main rival and it is perhaps only Ascari's untimely death in 1955, at a stage when both were double world champions, that prevents him from being a bigger part of this debate. He was most assuredly a great, but there's simply less to go on than with the main candidates.

Villeneuve performed some of the most remarkable feats of all in a racing car. Is his 1981 Monaco GP qualifying performance, 2.5s quicker than team-mate Didier Pironi, the greatest single lap in F1 history?

PLUS: Hamilton's place in F1's best qualifying lap debate

But he also had days where he overreached or made poor decisions - Prost or Senna would not have stayed on a deflating tyre (before his famous three-wheel antics) as long as Villeneuve did in the 1979 Dutch GP and ended up with a non-finish.

Unlike everyone else on this list - and like Max Verstappen, who is likely to be the next candidate - Villeneuve was never tested in a proper championship fight either. It could be that he would have not only rounded out those rough edges but proved himself in a title battle, but his death during qualifying for the 1982 Belgian GP meant he never got the chance.

Alonso is perhaps the most interesting one of all. Brilliant from the moment he arrived, capable of dragging out results whatever the machinery, he's the one driver of the 21st century so far who could claim to be Hamilton's equal.

PLUS: Fernando Alonso's 10 greatest F1 races

Alonso's decisions outside the cockpit have been unfortunate. How much that should count against him is open to debate, but it is probably fair to say that he has sometimes burned bridges and limited his options.

We can't know how he would fare against post-2017-spec Hamilton but, unless his return with Alpine leads to a chance to prove his superiority, Alonso's record doesn't stack up to Hamilton's.

Looking for weaknesses

To help separate this group of exceptional drivers requires looking for their few weaknesses. Listing their strengths further would be time-consuming and, for the most part, not help us to put them in any sort of order. So what are the weaknesses of this supergroup?

By his own admission, Prost was often not as decisive in traffic as Senna and lost several races, such as the 1989 Monaco GP, as a result

It's tough to find one for Fangio, with the possible exception that he moved from team to team and was never part of a long-term combination in the way that later drivers would be. He hardly ever made mistakes - Moss's pace at the 1956 Monaco GP was one of the few occasions that forced Fangio to look less than polished - although he was slightly less impressive in sportscars at a time when that was almost on a par with F1.

Statistically, Moss's obvious weakness is no world title to his name, but this is usually cited as evidence of how a points system can give the wrong result. Like Fangio, he rarely made errors and had arguably even fewer off days than his great friend, though missing a gear and blowing his Vanwall's engine in the 1958 Belgian GP did contribute to him losing that year's title.

The main criticism that can be levelled at Clark is that he only won races for Lotus. While it would be ridiculous to argue that he wouldn't have won for another squad, the fact is he did not - and he usually had access to the best equipment thanks to Colin Chapman's innovations. In F1 , he does not have as extensive a list of drives against the odds as Moss or Schumacher.

PLUS: Jim Clark's 10 greatest races

By his own admission, Prost was often not as decisive in traffic as Senna and lost several races, such as the 1989 Monaco GP, as a result. On the other hand, Senna's approach could be regarded as too risky on occasion.

His clashes with traffic in the 1988 Italian and 1990 Brazilian GPs were unnecessary and, whereas Prost did lose out to Senna through backmarkers, Mansell rarely did - and had fewer issues too, indicating there was a balance to be struck.

The main criticism of Schumacher is his dominant status within teams, and the fact that he never went directly up against the best of his rivals, most notably Hakkinen, in the same machinery. This is the other side of the coin of the team-building strength that Schumacher displayed - being able to mould a team around him, and attract such important figures as Ross Brawn and Rory Byrne from Benetton to Ferrari, has to be considered one of Schuey's greatest pluses.

Perhaps a more critical weakness was Schumacher's succumbing to pressure at key moments. The 1994 Australian GP clash with title rival Damon Hill came after Schumacher had already gone off, and even his successful 2003 campaign finished with a scrappy drive to eighth at Suzuka following contact with Takuma Sato that damaged his front wing. In both instances, he was perhaps fortunate to take the crown.

Changing the game

How much did our drivers change the game? Moss brought a level of professionalism that had rarely been seen before, something Stewart continued. Stewart also changed the sport perhaps more than any other thanks to his safety crusade. That is less directly relevant to his driving, but there are competitors alive today thanks to the changes he helped to bring.

Perhaps Hamilton's greatest on-track legacy will be showing that being the best doesn't require being unfair. He has achieved his success without some of the antics that Senna and Schumacher indulged in

Lauda revitalised Ferrari and produced two of the finest comebacks - first after his horrific 1976 German GP crash, and then when he came out of retirement in 1982 - but it's questionable if he changed the game.

Top 10: Niki Lauda's greatest races

Prost's analytical approach and Senna's intensity pushed the level of commitment required outside of the car to new heights, something that Schumacher continued. The German also upped the game in terms of fitness. Senna, Nelson Piquet and Mansell all had races where they had to be lifted from the car or collapsed afterwards, but Schumacher's superior fitness allowed him to free up extra capacity to improve his focus.

As gaps between cars became less, drivers had to find more ways of finding an advantage wherever they could. As well as Schumacher's fitness, he also pushed the limits when it came to such things as pitlane entry and what you could get away with in wheel-to-wheel combat.

Perhaps Hamilton's greatest on-track legacy will be showing that being the best doesn't require being unfair. He has achieved his success without some of the antics that Senna and Schumacher indulged in.

Level of competitiveness

If you were to assume the best driver of each era was operating at the same level - not as unreasonable as it sounds considering there is a (forever unknown) limit to how quickly any car can lap any circuit - then looking at the amount of competition can also be revealing.

We've looked at the number of winning teams (as opposed to constructors) in each world championship and the raw pace of all cars since 1950. The latter was calculated using supertimes - these are based on the fastest single lap by each car at each race weekend, expressed as a percentage of the fastest single lap overall (100.000%) and averaged over the season. We've looked at the gap between the first and second fastest cars in each season, and the gap between the first and fifth quickest.

PLUS: When was Formula 1 closest?

The first thing to note is that the 1950s was the least competitive era. The gaps between the cars were usually massive, and there were fewer top-line drivers compared to later decades.

Things improved during the first half of the 1960s during the 1500cc era, but the move to three litres spread the field out once more. The increasing availability of the Cosworth DFV - reducing a key variable - helped close the field during the 1970s, with the brief advantage gained by Lotus in 1978 with ground-effects being the main exception.

The rise of the first turbo era and manufacturer involvement spread things out again, notwithstanding the extraordinary 'transition' season of 1982 in which a record seven teams won races. The big gaps continued after the move back to normally aspirated engines from 1989, with 'gizmos' such as active suspension and traction control maintaining a field of haves and have-nots.

Only when such technologies were banned for 1994 did things start to close up and head back to 1970s levels, with the 2000s (particularly after the engine freeze in 2007) proving very close.

The arrival of the turbo-hybrid era in 2014 created bigger gaps, though that trend was reversed when the wider, faster cars arrived in 2017 - at least until Mercedes rolled out the W11 in 2020, steaming to victory in 13 wins from 17 races.

The greatest

So who wins our debate? The relative lack of competitiveness of the 1950s makes it hard for Fangio or Moss to take it. Lauda did not dominate his era as convincingly as the others, while Senna's arrival means Prost can't win either, even if it did take until 1991 for Senna to indisputably move ahead.

Stewart's wins with four different constructors (BRM, Matra, March, Tyrrell) and two teams must trump Clark's success with Lotus. Stewart himself would no doubt disagree, but his achievements without the benefit of a Chapman wondercar and more-equal relationship with Ken Tyrrell makes him the more complete driver. Clark also lacks an equivalent to Stewart's 1973 season, which he won in the third fastest car of the year.

There is a driver who ticks all of the same boxes as Hamilton, but does not have an equivalent to his 2011 season where he lost the plot and was well beaten by team-mate Jenson Button

PLUS: Jackie Stewart's 10 greatest races

Senna and Schumacher are among the most popular of our candidates. Both had flaws already covered, but the crucial element for both has to be their on-track etiquette. They both overstepped the mark far too often in wheel-to-wheel combat. Senna's 1990 Japanese GP take-out of Prost has to stand as one of the worst deliberate acts by anyone at the wheel of a racing car, whatever your views on the pair's clash the previous year.

Many of Senna's moves went beyond hard-but-fair, and changed the rules of engagement, which Schumacher then used regularly. The 'Schuey chop' at the start became a regular feature, there were the 1994 and 1997 title-deciding clashes and the infamous 2006 Monaco GP 'parking' fiasco.

Some would argue that this just shows the ruthlessness required, that any means justify the ends. Autosport does not share this view. To be the greatest in any sport requires not only winning, but the best ways to do so.

Fortunately, Hamilton has shown that it is possible to be incredibly successful and the defining driver of a generation, without 'winning at all costs'. There were mistakes early in his career, but his racecraft can be described as hard-but-fair. He is one of the best wheel-to-wheel drivers, but knows where the line is.

Even his potentially dubious attempt to 'reverse' Nico Rosberg back towards the pack in their 2016 Abu Dhabi season finale did not include any dangerous moves. Hamilton simply controlled the race. He has shown that winning the right way is important, and the sport is better for it.

Top 10: Lewis Hamilton's best F1 wins

So does he win this contest? No. Hamilton's level of performance since the second half of 2017 is probably the greatest thus far consistently reached by a driver, powered by his quest for continual improvement.

But there is a driver who ticks all of the same boxes, but does not have an equivalent to Hamilton's 2011 season, where he lost the plot and was well beaten by team-mate Jenson Button, or 2016, when his own poor starts contributed as much to his defeat as his reliability issues.

Jackie Stewart was sensational as a rookie, had strong team-mates, was brilliant in the wet, won with multiple constructors, formed a special relationship with a team boss, was operating in an increasingly competitive era, had great racecraft, rarely made mistakes, and won a title with a car that wasn't the best. He also changed the sport for the better and retired while still on top.

Someone better could one day come along and this debate will only get harder but we believe the oldest surviving F1 world champion tops the list. Jackie Stewart is The Greatest.