The F1 Drivers Who Racked Up the Most Retirements in Their Careers

Nigel Mansell, one of our featured drivers on this list, gives Ayrton Senna a lift after the 1991 British Grand Prix.Photo: Pascal Rondeau/Allsport (Getty Images)

When we celebrate Formula 1 history, we tend to go for the positives: The drivers with the highest win rates, or the most World Championships, or the greatest skill. But motorsport is a fickle beast, and today, I want to talk about that. Specifically, I want to talk about the drivers that have racked up the most race retirements in their careers.

I’ve ranked these by number of retirements in a career — not by the percentage of retirements to the driver’s career starts (though I did include those stats too, just because they’re fun). I’ve also included the first and last retirements for each driver. As a result, there aren’t tons of drivers from the early eras of F1 included here, since there just weren’t as many races in an F1 calendar back then.

This includes every retirement a driver has made as well: both where the driver was technically classified as having finished the race because, despite retiring, he had completed 90 percent of the race distance; and in cases where the car was disqualified after the race.