Graham Hill, because it should have been imposible for someone as poor as him with so few connections and with so little going for him to become world champion. He had a reputation for mechanical sympathy and only doing what was necessary to win but when the only way to win was going faster than everyone else in a car that certainly wasn’t the easiest to drive with a fire extinguisher floating around in the footwell on a rain soaked Nurburgring he won. His son was pretty good too.

Anyone know how Shui’s doing?

Eddie Irvine.. if it hadnt been for that pesky Micheal

According to this statistical model (done in 2014), the 10 best were: Jim Clark, Jackie Stewart, Ferndando Alonso, Michael Schumacher, Juan Fangio, James Hunt, Nico Rosberg, Sebestian Vettel, Alberto Ascari, and Niki Lauda were the ten best after accounting for the contribution of the car. The analysis uses comparisons with teammates as the main factor. Rosberg is there because he beat Schumacher and the model didn’t allow for Schumacher having declined massively in his comeback. Hamilton is not there because it was done before his recent dominance and he barely managed to beat Button and Rosberg, both of whom were much better than many people give them credit for. Still, very interesting that Senna and Prost didn’t make top ten. Senna dominated weak teammates, but struggled to beat Prost.

https://f1metrics.wordpress.com/2014/07/18/who-was-the-greatest-f1-driver/

Another methodology puts Senna and Prost in the top 10, but still with Clark number 1.

https://f1metrics.wordpress.com/2016/10/06/experts-versus-models-how-do-we-rank-drivers/

They were all greats and Hamilton is definitely a racer rather than a strategist.  There is more to come for him.

This is thread has just reminded me there was some truly great racing in the past and although uninspired to watch the current racing I might give it another shot.