Who is the most controversial Formula 1 world champion?

Every name here has a title and an asterisk somebody insists on adding. Deliberate collisions, team orders, stewards' rooms and one retirement nobody saw coming.

1

Michael Schumacher

Seven titles alongside the collisions at Adelaide in 1994 and Jerez in 1997, and the Monaco qualifying stop in 2006.

2

Lewis Hamilton

Seven titles alongside the Silverstone collision with Verstappen in 2021 and the disputed Abu Dhabi finish that cost him an eighth.

3

Ayrton Senna

Three titles and two Suzuka collisions with Prost that decided the 1989 and 1990 championships.

4

Alain Prost

Four titles, the other half of the Suzuka crashes, and a reputation for winning politics as well as races.

5

Nelson Piquet

Three titles and a habit of insulting rivals in print that would end a career today.

6

Fernando Alonso

Two titles, then the centre of the 2007 McLaren spy affair and the 2008 Singapore race his team-mate was told to crash.

7

Max Verstappen

Four titles won with a defensive style that has repeatedly forced the stewards to rewrite their own guidelines.

8

Sebastian Vettel

Four titles and the 2013 Malaysian Grand Prix, where he ignored a direct team order and passed his team-mate.

9

Nico Rosberg

One title taken from his own team-mate amid a season of collisions, then immediate retirement.

10

James Hunt

The 1976 title decided partly in appeal rooms, won by a driver who treated the paddock's rules as optional.

11

Jacques Villeneuve

The 1997 champion who spent the era criticising the sport out loud and was stripped of his Suzuka result.

12

Damon Hill

The 1996 champion whose title came a year after the Adelaide collision that ended his own challenge.

13

Niki Lauda

Three-time champion who walked away from the 1976 title decider in the rain and was judged for it for decades.

14

Keke Rosberg

Took the 1982 title with a single win in a season so chaotic that eleven drivers won races.