Alain Prost: 51 F1 Wins, Four World Titles, and the Thinking Man's Way to Win
Welcome to the Happy Hour Racing Formula 1 Driver Spotlight - where we pull one driver into the garage, look under the hood at their career, and tell you what made them great. This week: the man they called The Professor.
The Short Version
Alain Prost won four Formula 1 world championships and 51 grands prix, and he did almost all of it by being smarter than the field rather than braver. He raced for Renault, McLaren, Ferrari, and Williams between 1980 and 1993, and when he walked away he held the all-time record for wins, podiums, and fastest laps. If you only know one thing about Alain Prost, know this: he figured out that the fastest way to the checkered flag is almost never the fastest lap.
From a Furniture Shop in Lorette to the Formula 1 Grid
Alain Prost was born on February 24, 1955, in Lorette, a small town in the Loire region of France. He was not a racing kid, and there was no family team waiting for him. On a family holiday at age 14 he tried a go-kart, and that was the end of every other plan. He bought his own kart at 16 with money saved working in his father's furniture business, and in 1975 he won the French senior karting championship.
He came up through French single-seaters fast, and McLaren gave him a Formula 1 seat for 1980. He scored a point in his very first race, finishing sixth in the Argentine Grand Prix from twelfth on the grid. The car was fragile and the relationship soured, so he left after one season for Renault, the French team running the new turbo engines. His first win came at the 1981 French Grand Prix at Dijon, in front of a home crowd, in a French car. He has rarely had a better day at the office.
Signature Moments: Half a Point, a Record, and Suzuka
Prost returned to McLaren for 1984 and had one of the strangest seasons any driver has ever had. He won seven races to teammate Niki Lauda's five, and lost the championship by half a point, 72 to 71.5. It is still the closest title finish in Formula 1 history, and the half point existed only because the Monaco Grand Prix had been stopped early in the rain and paid half points. Prost had won that race.
He fixed it the hard way. He won the 1985 title and became the first French world champion in Formula 1, then defended it in 1986. In 1987 at the Portuguese Grand Prix he took his 28th career win and passed Jackie Stewart's long-standing record of 27, a number that had stood since 1973.
Then came Ayrton Senna. The two shared the McLaren-Honda garage in 1988 and 1989, and between them they won 15 of 16 races in 1988 alone. Senna took that title by three points despite Prost winning more races. The 1989 rematch ended at Suzuka, where the two collided at the chicane with seven laps left and Prost's third championship was decided in the gravel. A year later at the same circuit, Senna took Prost out at the first corner and sealed the 1990 title in return. Those two races are still the argument fans have at the bar.
ALAIN PROST #F1 CAREER STATS
February 24, 2017
By the Numbers
Here is the whole career laid out. Every figure below is a Formula 1 world championship total.
The Ferrari Detour and the Perfect Last Season
Prost left McLaren for Ferrari in 1990 and won five races, losing the title to Senna at Suzuka. The 1991 Ferrari was a dog, Prost said so out loud by comparing it to a truck, and Ferrari fired him before the final race of the year. He sat out all of 1992.
The comeback was close to flawless. Williams signed him for 1993, and he started every single one of the 16 races from the front row, took 13 poles, won seven races, and clinched his fourth title in Portugal with two rounds still to run. He finished the year 26 points clear of Senna. Then he retired at 38, on top, and his final race was that Adelaide Sunday in the photo at the top of this page. Senna won it, pulled Prost up onto the top step of the podium, and hugged him. Six months later Senna was gone, and Prost was a pallbearer at his funeral.
Life Off the Track
They called him The Professor because he raced like one. He managed tires, saved the car, and famously tried to win as slowly as he could get away with, which is less glamorous than a qualifying lap and far better at putting four championship trophies on a shelf. France made him a member of the Legion of Honour in 1985, and Britain gave him an honorary OBE in 1993 for winning all four of his titles in British-built cars.
He has never really left the sport. He bought the Ligier team in 1997 and ran it as Prost Grand Prix for five seasons, scoring two second-place finishes and sixth in the 1997 constructors' standings before the money ran out and the team went under in early 2002. He has since called that venture his biggest professional mistake. He went ice racing instead and won the Andros Trophy three times, co-owned the Renault e.dams Formula E team that won three straight team titles, and spent years as an adviser at Renault and Alpine. His son Nicolas, known as Nico, drove for that same Formula E team, which made father and son boss and employee for a while. Prost is also a serious road cyclist, which fits a man whose whole racing philosophy was about managing effort.
The Bottom Line
Ayrton Senna got the mythology and Michael Schumacher eventually got the records, but for 14 years Alain Prost was the standard. He proved that patience, tire management, and a cool head will beat raw speed over a season, and 51 wins across four different teams says he was right.
Shop the Story
We do not have Alain Prost gear in the shop, but we do carry the teams he won his 51 races for. All of these are in stock right now:
- McLaren F1 Lifestyle New Era 9Fifty Camo Baseball Hat - McLaren is where 30 of his wins and three of his titles came from.
- New Era McLaren Racing 9FIFTY Snapback Cap
- McLaren Racing F1 New Era Shadow Beanie
- New Era Renault F1 Alpine 9Fifty Adjustable Cap - Renault gave him his first win at Dijon in 1981.
- Scuderia Ferrari Garage Crew T-Shirt - five more wins came in red in 1990.
The rest of the Formula 1 lids live in the F1 hats collection. Have a look if you want something new on your head before the next grand prix.
