Berger in numbers
385 official points · best championship finish: 3rd in 1988
0Drivers’ titles
none
2Constructors’ titles
1990, 1991
24th of 789 all time
4.8% of races
5.7% of races
22.9% of races
0Drivers’ titles
none
0Constructors’ titles
none
0Drivers’ titles
none
0Constructors’ titles
none
0Drivers’ titles
none
0Constructors’ titles
none
4.3% of races with Benetton
2.2% of races with Benetton
13% of races with Benetton
0Drivers’ titles
none
0Constructors’ titles
none
5.2% of races with Ferrari
7.3% of races with Ferrari
25% of races with Ferrari
0Drivers’ titles
none
2Constructors’ titles
1990, 1991
of 2 in the career
6.3% of races with McLaren
8.3% of races with McLaren
37.5% of races with McLaren
Gerhard Berger won ten Grands Prix across fourteen seasons and finished third in the championship in 1988 and 1994, but his place in history is marked by something harder to measure: he was Ayrton Senna's team-mate at McLaren for three years and came out of it with the relationship intact. That is no small thing. Nobody else managed it.
He joined McLaren in 1990 knowing what was coming and accepting the role. Senna won, he scored, and in between they built a friendship made of elaborate practical jokes still retold in the paddock: the briefcase thrown from a helicopter, the doctored passport. When Senna died at Imola, Berger was the one who accompanied him back to Brazil.
His relationship with Ferrari was longer and more complicated. He was there in two spells and both times arrived at the wrong moment, just before or just after the good years. He won his last race at Hockenheim in 1997, weeks after his father's death and having missed three Grands Prix with sinusitis, in one of the most complete farewells any driver has had.
Ver en españolRating by season
- First season
- 81 1988
- Peak
- 81 1988
- 1997
- 77 Benetton
10 seasons in the database, from 1988 to 1997. Our own rating, from 50 to 99.
Teams
Tags
Best year
1988
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His team-mates
8 team-mates across 14 seasons. When both finished the race, Berger was ahead in 28 of 64; on the grid he started ahead in 98 of 206.
| Year | Team-mate | In the race | On the grid |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1984 | Manfred WinkelhockATS · 1 race | · | 1-0 |
| 1985 | Thierry BoutsenArrows · 16 races | 2-4 | 5-11 |
| 1986 | Teo FabiBenetton · 16 races | 1-2 | 12-4 |
| 1987 | Michele AlboretoFerrari · 16 races | 2-1 | 12-4 |
| 1988 | Michele AlboretoFerrari · 16 races | 6-1 | 16-0 |
| 1989 | Nigel MansellFerrari · 14 races | · | 7-7 |
| 1990 | Ayrton SennaMcLaren · 16 races | 1-7 | 4-12 |
| 1991 | Ayrton SennaMcLaren · 16 races | 1-6 | 3-13 |
| 1992 | Ayrton SennaMcLaren · 16 races | 1-3 | 1-15 |
| 1993 | Jean AlesiFerrari · 16 races | 1-1 | 7-9 |
| 1994 | Jean AlesiFerrari · 14 races | 3-1 | 6-8 |
| 1994 | Nicola LariniFerrari · 2 races | · | 2-0 |
| 1995 | Jean AlesiFerrari · 17 races | 3-3 | 12-5 |
| 1996 | Jean AlesiBenetton · 16 races | 1-3 | 3-13 |
| 1997 | Jean AlesiBenetton · 14 races | 6-4 | 7-7 |
The first number is always Berger's. A team-mate is whoever started the same race for the same team. "In the race" only counts races both finished, because a retirement says nothing about who was quicker. "On the grid" is the starting position, with penalties already applied.
Compare Berger with another driver
Titles, wins, poles and podiums side by side, against any of the 789 drivers in history.
Keep reading
Where Gerhard Berger comes up in what we have measured, with our own numbers.
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- 6 min readIn the eighties four cars in ten finished. Today more than eight doThe biggest change in Formula 1 is invisible, because it happens in the workshop. Four straight decades below 52% of cars finishing, then a climb t…
- 8 min readHow much is pole worth? 709 races say half, and that the circuit hardly mattersPole converts into a win 50% of the time since 1988. The surprise is the other half: a track’s reputation predicts nothing. Monza converts more pol…