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Leading from the back

British driver Mike Hawthorn won the 1958 Formula One title © Getty Images

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You recently wrote about the drivers who had won the most Grands Prix without ever being world champion. But which champion won the fewest races in his Formula One career? asked George Kehoe

There are joint leaders here: Mike Hawthorn, the British driver who won the F1 title in 1958, and the American Phil Hill (1961) both won only three GPs in their careers. Hill actually ended up with fewer points overall (98) than any other world champion.

Two of Hill's wins (in Belgium and Italy) came in his Championship-winning season. Hawthorn only won once in 1958, but his other results were enough to give him the title: Keke Rosberg, in 1982, is the only other driver to win the championship having won just one race in the season.

Keke Rosberg and Nino Farina, the inaugural champion in 1950, both won five races in all in their F1 careers. John Surtees (1964) won six, as did Jochen Rindt - five of them in 1970, before his death in a crash towards the end of the season in Italy resulted in him being the only posthumous world champion.

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