Lights Out: 31 Seasons of F1, Lap by Lap

Lewis Hamilton led 5,531 laps, more than one in every seven raced since 1996

Every race lap has exactly one leader, so the 583 races in the data contain 35,546 laps led. Lewis Hamilton led 5,531 of them (15.6%), 1,594 more than Michael Schumacher (3,937), even though Schumacher's first five championship seasons fall before this data begins.

Leading is concentrated at the very top. Hamilton, Schumacher, Max Verstappen (3,883) and Sebastian Vettel (3,501) together led 16,852 laps, or 47.4% of all laps raced since 1996. Verstappen passed Vettel for third in 2025 and is now just 54 laps behind Schumacher. Fernando Alonso (1,773) and Charles Leclerc (1,000) are the other drivers in the top 10 still racing in 2026.

Red Bull's 2023 season was the most one-sided since 1996: 86.7% of laps led

For each season, the chart shows the constructor that led the most laps and its share of that season's laps. The seasons run in clear eras: Williams (1996–97), McLaren (1998–99), Ferrari (2000–2004), Red Bull (2010–2013), Mercedes (2014–2020) and Red Bull again (2021–2024). McLaren topped 2025 (57.1%), and Mercedes leads 2026 so far with 65.2% of the laps run.

Red Bull led 1,149 of 1,325 laps in 2023 (86.7%), just ahead of Mercedes in 2014 (980 laps, 86.3%) and 2016 (83.2%). The closest seasons were 2012, when Red Bull led only 36.4%, and 2003, when Ferrari led 37.6%. Mercedes topped the table for seven straight years, the longest run in the data.

Bars are coloured by team lineage: Brawn's 2009 bar is Mercedes teal because Brawn became Mercedes. In 2006 Ferrari and Renault tied on 520 laps led each; the bar shows Ferrari.

The leader after lap 1 goes on to win 56% of races

The driver in first place at the end of lap 1 won 325 of 583 races (55.7%). Second place after lap 1 won 23.0% of the time, and third place 9.8%. From fourth place on, the odds collapse: only 67 races (11.5%) were won by a driver running fourth or lower after the first lap, and just 9 by a driver outside the top 10.

Lap 1 position is used instead of grid position because the data records positions at the end of each lap. It already includes the start and the first corners, where many races are decided.

Finishing became the norm: 57% of starters were classified in 1996, 93% in 2024

A driver is classified when they complete at least 90% of the winner's laps (the FIA rule). In 1996 only 176 of 310 starts (56.8%) were classified. By 2024 that rose to 432 of 465 (92.9%). The rate climbed steadily through the early 2000s and passed 90% for the first time in 2021 (91.6%), and 2025 was almost as high (92.5%). The first 15 races under the new 2026 rules have dipped to 82.5% (264 of 320 starts), the lowest since 2010 (79.7%).

The biggest single jump came in 2004–2005 (from 69.7% in 2003 to 76.4% and then 80.0%), when rules started forcing engines to last a whole race weekend and then two. Over all 31 seasons, 80.0% of starts ended classified.

DRS and fast-wearing tyres made 2011–2013 the busiest era for changes of position

Counting every place a driver gains from one lap to the next (the start is excluded) gives a measure of how much the order changes during a race. From 1996 to 2010 a race averaged 149 places gained. In 2011 the sport added DRS (a rear wing that opens on straights) and Pirelli's deliberately fast-wearing tyres. The average jumped to 248 per race in 2011–2013, peaking at 253.8 in 2012.

The count dropped to its lowest point, 108.4 in 2017, the first year of wider, high-downforce cars that struggle to follow each other. It recovered to 186.4 in 2023 under the 2022 ground-effect rules, was 161.8 in 2025, and stands at 137.2 for the new 2026 cars so far. This count includes places swapped during pit stops, so it measures how much the order changes rather than strictly overtakes.

At Monaco, 2014's hybrid cars were 4 seconds a lap slower than 2004's V10s

Monaco's street circuit has barely changed since 1996, which makes it a good stopwatch for the cars themselves. The fastest race lap fell from 1:25.205 in 1996 to 1:14.439 in 2004, the peak of the V10 era. The 2014 switch to 1.6-litre hybrid engines and narrower cars pushed it back up to 1:18.479, 4.04 seconds slower.

The wider 2017 cars won the time back straight away (1:14.820), and the fastest Monaco race lap in the data is 1:12.909, set in 2021; 2025 (1:13.221) and 2026 (1:13.481) are the next fastest. Race laps depend on fuel load, tyres and weather. The 1997 race was run in heavy rain and was stopped at the two-hour time limit after 62 of its 78 scheduled laps, so its fastest lap was 1:53.315, more than 30 seconds slower than the dry 1998 race (1:22.948). That point is marked at the top edge of the chart instead of being drawn to scale. Monaco was not held in 2020 because of the pandemic.

Purple marks the fastest lap, as on F1 timing screens.

The season grew from 16 races to 24, and the field ran 85% more laps

There were 16 Grands Prix in 1996 and 24 in both 2024 and 2025, the record. Most of the growth came after 2015 (19 races), with new rounds in Azerbaijan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Miami and Las Vegas. The 2020 season was cut to 17 races by the pandemic.

More races and fuller finishing fields add up: the drivers together completed 14,431 laps in 1996 and 26,657 in 2025, 84.7% more. The 2026 season has had 15 races so far.

British and German drivers won 56% of all races

By the nationality of the winning driver, Britain now leads with 167 wins (19 drivers, led by Hamilton, with Lando Norris and George Russell adding 14 in 2025–2026) and Germany follows with 158 (13 drivers, led by Schumacher and Vettel). Together they won 325 of the 583 races (55.7%).

The Netherlands is third with 71 wins, all by one driver: Max Verstappen. Five other Dutch drivers raced in this period without winning. Finland's 52 wins came from four drivers: Räikkönen (21), Häkkinen (20), Bottas (10) and Kovalainen (1).

Four team lineages won 89% of races; Haas has yet to win one

F1 teams change names when they change owners, so the report groups each constructor under the team it became on the 2025 grid. For example, Tyrrell → BAR → Honda → Brawn → Mercedes, and Stewart → Jaguar → Red Bull. On that basis Ferrari leads with 146 wins, followed by the Mercedes lineage (141) and the Red Bull lineage (131).

Add McLaren's 101 and those four lineages account for 519 of 583 wins (89.0%). The Enstone team (Benetton → Renault → Lotus → Alpine) won 24 and Williams 31, most of them in the 1990s. Haas has 443 race starts since 2016 and has never led a lap. Cadillac joined in 2026 as the first new team since Haas.

Grey marks a team that no longer races. Ligier's one win (Olivier Panis, Monaco 1996) is the only win by any of the 13 defunct teams; the other 12 never won a race in this period.