– The Miami Grand Prix is coming up this weekend. This means that it has now been about four years since a Ferrari driver led the Formula 1 Drivers’ World Championship. The last time this happened was at the Miami Grand Prix in 2022.
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In the list of the latest Formula 1 World Championship leaders (click through our photo gallery here!) Leclerc has now slipped to sixth place. Since the Miami GP in early May 2022, five other drivers have led the World Championship.
Under the then completely new Formula 1 regulations, Ferrari started the new season almost perfectly. Leclerc won two of the first three races and led the championship up to and including the fifth race of the season in Florida.
However, at the sixth race of the season in Spain, Leclerc retired with a power unit problem, which allowed Red Bull driver Max Verstappen to take the championship lead with a win in Barcelona – and he never gave it up until the end of the season.
Photo gallery: The last 25 World Championship leaders in Formula 1
That was almost four years ago now. Ferrari last experienced a longer dry spell in the Drivers’ World Championship between 2012 and 2017. Fernando Alonso last led the championship for the Scuderia at the Japanese Grand Prix in October 2012.
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The next World Championship leader in red was then Sebastian Vettel at the season opener in March 2017 in Australia – almost four and a half years later.
Incidentally, Lewis Hamilton’s last championship lead is even further back now. The second Ferrari driver alongside Charles Leclerc last led the World Championship after the Russian Grand Prix 2021, when he was still driving for Mercedes.
The race in Sochi took place on September 26, 2021 – so more than four and a half years ago now. In our photo gallery, Hamilton is now only in seventh place and thus behind teammate Leclerc.
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In total, 20 different drivers have led the Formula 1 World Championship so far this millennium. Our list therefore goes back to the 1990s.
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