The Best and Worst of Teammate Championship Battles in Formula 1

This weekend, the 2014 Formula 1 World Drivers' Championship will be decided with the outcome of the final race of the tour's season; the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix at the Yas Marina Circuit. Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg, the dominant duo of 2014 wheeling the Mercedes-Benz F1 W05 Hybrid race cars for Mercedes AMG, stand 17 points apart heading into the race event. Though their collective efforts resulted in 15 victories in 18 races in 2014 providing the Mercedes AMG team with a constructors' title, Rosberg and Hamilton are left to duke out the outcome of the drivers' title.

Since 1950, the teammates have finished in the first and second place in the Formula 1 World Championship 17 times in past seasons (if you include the 1997 season Williams drivers Jacques Villeneuve and Heinz-Herald Frentzen finished at the top after Michael Schumacher was excluded from the official results). For Mercedes-Benz, it is the second time their drivers will be placed in a one-two scenario in the points. Juan Manuel Fangio won the championship over Mercedes teammate Sterling Moss in 1955. The last time teammates finished at the top of the points occurred a decade ago when Michael Schumacher convincingly prevailed over teammate Rubens Barrichello at Ferrari.

Below are five examples of teammates who matched each other in neat identical equipment knowing, between the two drivers, only who could be proclaimed a champion.

1950: Alfa Romeo with Giuseppe Farina and Juan Manuel Fangio

In the first season of the Formula 1 tour, the young post-war racing scene of 1950 was immediately dominated by Alfa Romeo. The Italian automaker won all but one of the races involved in the 1950 Formula 1 schedule (the Indianapolis 500 was originally scored as a Formula 1 points race allowing a Kurtis Kraft-Offenhauser driven by Johnnie Parsons to claim a victory on the schedule). For the inaugural world drivers' championship, it was Italian Giuseppe Farina and Argentinian Juan Manuel Fangio in battle against each other. With only the best four of seven race finishes counting on the tour, Giuseppe Farina won the title thanks to wins at Silverstone, Monza and the Swiss Grand Prix at Circuit Bremgarten. Farina's one and only Formula 1 title, Fangio would win his first of five championships the following season. The two drivers are also recorded as the oldest competitors to be crowned Formula 1 champions.

1967: Brabham with Denny Hulme and Jack Brabham

An almost ridiculously impossible idea in modern Formula 1 racing, the recently-departed Sir Jack Brabham was a driver and team owner through the second-half of the 1960s. Not only was Brabham able to win races the with the same name, the Australian won a championship in 1966. For 1967, the Repco-engined Brabham race cars driven by Jack Brabham and teammate Denny Hulme faced Lotus and their all-new Ford-Cosworth DFV V8 engine. While the Lotus-Ford was powerful and quick, the Brabham-Repco proved more consistent over the course of the 1967 season. With 9 of 11 races being tallied for the drivers' title, the New Zealand driver Denny Hulme 2 wins and 8 podium finishes gave him a 5-point edge over his boss. Hulme moved to McLaren in 1968 while the Brabham team would perform poorly a season after winning the driver and constructor title.

1979: Ferrari with Jody Scheckter and Gilles Villeneuve 

The Ferrari team's long tenure in Formula 1 has resulted in 15 constructors' championships and four occasions where two team drivers finished one-two for the drivers' title. In 1979, teams hunting for a technological edge with ground effects and turbocharged engines contributed to a season plagued with front-running drivers claiming numerous race retirements. Ferrari team drivers Jody Scheckter and Gilles Villeneuve enjoyed a more reliable 1979 campaign with five DNFs combined (less than the total non-finishes of the third-place in points Alan Jones. With one fewer retirement, Scheckter was able to claim a four-point edge over the Canadian driver.

The title was a well-earned honour after much hard work for Scheckter as a veteran in Formula 1. The South African driver finished second in the championship in 1977 driving a Wolf-Ford owned by Austrian-born Canadian Walter Wolf. The 1979 Ferrari season produced Jody Scheckter's only championship and was the highest points placement in the career of Gilles Villeneuve.

1984: McLaren with Niki Lauda and Alain Prost

Frenchman Alain Prost would gain the status as a Formula 1 legend between a career that stretch from 1980 to 1993 consisting of 51 race victories within at time. While he would win four championships, Prost would finish second two consecutive times in the drivers' point before claiming his first. On the second occasion was in 1984 when Alain Prost returned to McLaren after three seasons with the Renault team. Competing in his 12th season in Formula 1 competition, returning McLaren driver Niki Lauda was aggressively challenged by the young Frenchman in the team's Porsche-powered race machine. Prost posted seven win in the 1984 compared to Lauda's five but the more veteran Formula 1 pilot's four second-place finishes kept him in the hunt. A rain-shortened Monaco Grand Prix ultimately cost Prost the championship. Instead of nine points for a win, the race being called prior to the half-way distance resulted in 4.5 points for Prost. Niki Lauda won the 1984 drivers' title by half a point becoming the closest season-ending championship result in the history of the open wheel racing tour.

The championship victory for Niki Lauda was his third and final Formula 1 title. Defending his title, Lauda retired from the sport after the 1985 season where Prost assumed champion honours.

1989: McLaren with Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna

The 1989 Formula 1 season was a battle among two motorsport titans. Teammates at McLaren, Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost rapidly shifted from having a generally cooperative relationship to being bitter rivals. Joining the team in 1988, Senna claimed his first championship with McLaren by overcoming Prost by three points thanks to eight race wins.

In 1989, the catalyst to what morphed into an outright poisonous relationship between Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna was the second race of the year at San Marino. Acting against an pre-race agreement, Senna passed Prost on a restart to win the event. First and second in the championship with the top eleven finishes coming for the championship, Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost headed into the second-to-last race in Suzuka, Japan. Failing to finish in five races, Senna required a good finish at the Japanese Grand Prix to contend against Prost. Both McLaren-Honda race cars started on the front row with Senna taking pole. During the race, Alain Prost gained the lead but Ayrton Senna was able to caught the other McLaren on lap 46. With a chance to pass Prost, Senna ran alongside his teammate intent to take the lead. The two cars fought their each other into a corner and made contact. Prost retired following the collision but Senna continued in his McLaren-Honda. Despite crossing the line first, Formula 1 stewards ruled Senna missed a chicane and disqualified the Brazilian driver effectively heading the 1989 world drivers' title to Alain Prost. A similar incident occurred the next season at Suzuka with Ayrton Senna remaining with McLaren and Prost joining Ferrari. That time, Senna came out as the victor for the 1990 championship.

The Senna/Prost battle for the 1989 championship is considered the ultimate inner-team fight some Formula 1 observers were expecting to see arise in 2014. An altercation during the Belgian Grand Prix saw a rivalry between Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg erupt in a very public manner. However, after what seemed to be some stern words from team principal Toto Wolff, the relationship between the two championship contending teammate has appeared civil. The outcome of the 2014 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix will conclude whether the fight between the Mercedes AMG drivers will be another storied one.

May 1, 2014: 20 Years After the Passing of Ayrton Senna

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May 1st, 1994, the start of a new month consisted of the third race on the Formula 1 tour for its respective year. Staging in Imola, Italy, the San Marino Grand Prix was being held in a season quickly redefining trends in Formula 1. However, it was that Italian Formula 1 race in 1994 that greatly shook the motorsport world. Now 20 years in the past, that race in known for the last moments of a man regarded as an inexhaustible source of talent and heroics. It was the day the world lost the great Ayrton Senna.

Back in 1994

Prior to the start of the 1994 Formula 1 season, new technical rules altered the path for which cars were being developed. Banning electronic driving aids delivered the first change for drivers of some teams. Masterfully executed by the Williams F1 team on their dominant FW15C race car in 1993, electronic aids such as an active suspension and traction control was used by Alain Prost en route to a fourth and final Formula 1 drivers' title. With Prost's retirement from Formula 1, the second-biggest change came when Ayrton Senna joined Williams.

A driver attached to McLaren since 1988, Senna left behind his Marlboro-sponsored car in favour of a Rothman-backed Williams-Renault. Seen as a potential dream teaming before the start of the 1994 campaign, the Formula 1 season started with Senna and his Williams-Renault struggling. Qualifying on pole for both the Brazilian and Pacific Grand Prix, Senna's two races wheeling the Williams FW16 ended with retirement. Having built a race car lacking the electronic driving aids, some attributed the removal of high-tech handling features as a challenge to developing a stable vehicle for Senna. For the 34-year-old Ayrton Senna, some additional pressure came from the fact his experience was being outweighed by the talent of a young Michael Schumacher who won first two grand prix events as title contender.

During Saturday for the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix weekend, Senna along with everyone part of Formula 1 was stunned by the death of rookie Austrian driver Roland Ratzenberger. In a determined by sadly unwise move to gain a spot on the Formula 1 grid in Imola, Ratzenberger attempted to qualify with a damaged front wing on his Simtek when it broke causing a fatal crash into a concrete wall. Despite what was the first death on a Formula 1 race weekend since 1982, the grand prix was held with Ayrton Senna starting at the front for the third consecutive time in the season. Due to an early race crash resulting in a safety car period, the Senna and the field received their first green flag lap of the San Marino track on lap 6. By lap 7, as the Formula 1 cars were at full speed, the Williams-Renault of Ayrton Senna straight-lined a curve at high-speed crashing violently into a concrete retaining wall. A 135-mile per hour crash, the Williams FW16 was torn to pieces as the driver was subjected to extreme forces and flying debris. An emergency team arrived on the scene but Ayrton Senna could not be saved and was declared deceased later that day.

The reason and circumstances of the Senna crash is still a contentious issue. While a steering column break has been widely pointed to as the reason for the crash, Williams engineers at the time Patrick Head and Adrian Newey argued against it. Both engineers as well as the team's boss Frank Williams were even subjected to criminal proceedings in Italy. Some less supported claims point that the accident was the result of driver error or even suicide.

20 Years Later

Reliving the circumstances of that time described by Murray Walker as the "blackest day for grand prix racing that I can remember", the death of Ayrton Senna definitely affected a sizable population. When we look back him after 20 years, the viewing Senna's accomplishments is one that can not be done in a single type of analysis.

Statistically after 11 seasons in Formula 1, Ayrton Senna has true reason to be considered among the greats of the sport. A three-time World Drivers' Champion in Formula 1, Senna posted impressive numbers in his career. 41 wins ranks him third in all-time grand prix victories in Formula 1. His 65 pole positions stood as a record in the sport until 2006 when Michael Schumacher surpassed this qualifying number. With 68 poles, Schumacher's record-breaking pole resulted on the same San Marino circuit where Ayrton Senna's final race took place 12 years prior. Senna finished on the podium for just under half of the 162 races he competed in.

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However, basing Ayrton Senna's racing accomplishments on racing alone is somewhat hollow. On the track, drives by the Brazilian was what really captivated Formula 1 audiences. There was a near-win in wet conditions at the 1984 Monaco Grand Prix driving a Toleman. Driving for Team Lotus, Senna's first win in the Portuguese rain in 1985 was regarded as a hard-fought victory. One year later, Senna held off the Williams-Renault piloted by Nigel Mansell by a slim 0.014-second margin. In 1993, the Ford-powered McLaren at Donington Park charged from fourth to first on the opening lap in a moment seen as one of the best performances in Formula 1. Of course, the on-track rivalry with other drivers have provided some of the greatest action in motorsports. While Ayrton Senna had some spirited battles with the Nigel Mansell on several occasions, clearly Alain Prost was Senna's greatest rival.

The Senna versus Prost battle ignited during 1988 when McLaren hired the Brazilian to companion with the Frenchman in their Honda-powered race cars. An adversary that brewed between the two drivers was a battle among titans that resulted in battle getting so nasty it divided the McLaren race team. A feud between Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost reached a highpoint for the 1989 and 1990 Formula 1 seasons but their combativeness lasted until Prost's retirement after the 1993 tour. However, prior to Senna's death, the two had reconciled their bad blood to the point of friendship. Following the 2011 release of the documentary 'Senna', Alain Prost voiced displeasure that the relationship wasn't fully documented. It was stated in the documentary that Prost served as a pallbearer at his funeral and has served on the board of Instituto Ayrton Senna. 

If there was one positive thing that came from the tragic loss of Senna, it was Formula 1's investment into safety. Following the San Marino Grand Prix race weekend where Ayrton Senna and Roland Ratzenberger were killed in crashes, steps were promptly made to slow down the race vehicles with mandated changes to the race cars as well as to the race tracks. In years following the fatal crashes, cars have been reengineered for greater driver survivability in a serious crash. Since 1994, there has not been a driver fatality in Formula 1.

Finally, we look at the personal impact Ayrton Senna has had to participants and enthusiasts of motorsports. In his native Brazil, Ayrton Senna was a nearly worshipped figure in his time fighting for Formula 1 victories. Not the first Brazilian Formula 1 champion (Emerson Fittipaldi captured the title in 1972 and 1974), Ayrton Senna has given his country a source of national pride and gave back through charitable causes. Outside of Brazil, Senna is still a source of fascination much in the same way as Elvis Presley. The driver's legacy has maintained popularity for the merchandise depicting his era among McLaren, Lotus, Toleman as well as Williams in Formula 1. This enthusiasm for Ayrton Senna has also been rekindled with the popular, award-winning Senna documentary.

Despite his tragic passing at the wheel, Brazilian race car driver has inspired the motorsport dreams of a new generation of racers. Even to this day, so many open wheel racing star has been heard embracing Senna as an idol.

His impact on the motorsport has been great. It's the desire of myself as well as many others that Ayrton Senna's life is seen as the spiritual uprising demonstrating the greatness that can emerge from us when we find our unique talents and pursue it tirelessly.