In Formula 1, rain changes everything. When a track is dry, the fastest car usually wins because grip is high and the racing line is predictable. But when rain falls, the track becomes slippery and unpredictable, visibility drops to almost nothing because of the spray kicked up by other cars, and even the best car in the world can suddenly become hard to control.
In these moments, it isn’t always the driver with the fastest car who wins. It’s the driver with the calmest mind and the sharpest reflexes who wins.
Top 10 Best Wet Weather F1 Drivers
Here are the 10 greatest wet-weather drivers in F1 History.
1. Ayrton Senna
Ayrton Senna is widely regarded as the greatest wet-weather driver Formula 1 has ever seen. Across his career, he won over half of all the wet races he entered. His most legendary rainy drive came at the 1993 European Grand Prix at Donington Park, where Senna started the race in fifth place after a poor first corner, but on the opening lap alone he overtook Michael Schumacher, Karl Wendlinger, Damon Hill, and Alain Prost, one after another, to take the lead by the end of lap one.
Many fans and experts still call it the greatest single lap in Formula 1 history.
Senna passed away in 1994 following a crash at the San Marino Grand Prix while leading the race.
2. Michael Schumacher
Michael Schumacher earned the nickname ‘Rain Master,’ largely because of his performance at the 1996 Spanish Grand Prix.
Driving a Ferrari, Schumacher fought back from a poor start in torrential rain to take the lead and then pulled away from the entire field, at times lapping around five seconds faster per lap than his closest rivals. He won the race by around 45 seconds, and it remains one of the most talked-about wet-weather drives in F1 history.
Schumacher retired from Formula 1 for good at the end of the 2012 season, and in December 2013, he suffered a severe skiing accident that left him with serious brain injuries. Since then, his family has kept details of his health and recovery entirely private.
3. Lewis Hamilton
Lewis Hamilton‘s wet-weather statistics are remarkable; his win rate in rain-affected races is significantly higher than his overall win rate.
His standout rainy performance came at the 2008 British Grand Prix at Silverstone, where he won by 68.577 seconds. He also delivered a memorable wet win at the 2020 Turkish Grand Prix, which sealed his seventh World Championship.
Lewis Hamilton is still racing in Formula 1 today. After eleven seasons with Mercedes, he joined Ferrari for the 2025 season. His first year with the Italian team was difficult, but in 2026 he took his first Grand Prix win for Ferrari at the Spanish Grand Prix in Barcelona.
4. Max Verstappen
Max Verstappen has built his own reputation as one of the best rain drivers of the modern era, with two standout performances both coming at Interlagos in Sao Paulo, Brazil.
In 2016, as a teenager in his Red Bull career, he recovered from a poorly timed pit stop to fight his way up to a podium finish. Then in 2024, Max Verstappen started the race all the way down in 17th place after a grid penalty and a disrupted qualifying session, and produced one of the greatest comebacks in F1 history to win the race, finishing over 19 seconds clear of the field.
Max Verstappen continues to race in Formula 1 for Red Bull Racing and remains one of the sport’s most successful active drivers.
5. Jim Clark
Jim Clark is often described as one of the most naturally gifted drivers ever to sit in a F1 car, and his smoothness worked best in wet conditions, at a time when cars had far less grip, no modern safety features, and tracks were extremely dangerous when wet.
At the 1963 Belgian Grand Prix at Spa-Francorchamps, Jim Clark battled heavy spray and a misbehaving gearbox to win the race by just under five minutes.
Jim Clark was killed in 1968 while competing in a Formula 2 race at Hockenheim in Germany, when his car left the track in wet conditions.
6. Jackie Stewart
Jackie Stewart’s performance at the 1968 German Grand Prix at the old Nurburgring is often called one of the greatest drives of all time. Racing with a broken wrist through thick fog and pouring rain so heavy that visibility was down to a few dozen metres in places, Stewart won the race by more than four minutes.
He retired from F1 at the end of 1973 as a three-time World Champion. He later became a television commentator and, in the late 1990s, ran his own Formula 1 team, Stewart Grand Prix.
7. Jacky Ickx
Jacky Ickx was one of the earliest drivers widely recognized for his skill in the rain, well before ‘rain master’ became a common phrase in F1. He was especially known for his ability to control a car in low-grip, low-visibility conditions, with notable wet-weather drives including a win at the 1968 French Grand Prix at Rouen and another at the 1969 German Grand Prix.
Away from F1, he became even more famous as one of the greatest endurance racers in history.
Ickx retired from Formula 1 in 1979 but continued racing for many more years, winning the Le Mans 24 Hours a total of six times and even winning the gruelling Paris-Dakar Rally in 1983.
8. Jenson Button
Jenson Button built a reputation as one of the smartest wet and mixed-conditions drivers of his generation. His most famous performance came at the 2011 Canadian Grand Prix, where Button pitted six times, dropped to last place at one stage, and still fought all the way back through the field to win the race on the very last lap.
Statistically, his win rate in wet races was far higher than his win rate in dry races across his career, showing just how much the rain suited his driving style.
Jenson Button retired from full-time Formula 1 racing at the end of 2016, though he made one further appearance in 2017. Since then, he has worked as a F1 television pundit.
9. Sebastian Vettel
Sebastian Vettel’s breakthrough win came in the rain. At the 2008 Italian Grand Prix at Monza, driving for the smaller Toro Rosso team, the 21-year-old German took pole position and then won the race in wet conditions, becoming the youngest driver ever to win a F1 Grand Prix at the time.
It was an early sign of the composure in difficult conditions that would go on to help him win four consecutive World Championships with Red Bull a few years later.
Sebastian Vettel retired from F1 at the end of the 2022 season. Since retiring, he has largely stepped back from the public racing spotlight and focused his attention on environmental and sustainability causes.
10. Fernando Alonso
Fernando Alonso has long been admired for his adaptability when conditions keep changing during a race, rather than for one single dominant wet-weather blowout.
His win at the 2007 European Grand Prix at the Nurburgring is a good example: the race included a red flag stoppage after a huge downpour, and Alonso had to adjust his driving as the track alternated between wet and dry, eventually passing Felipe Massa’s Ferrari with a bold move just five laps from the end to win by 8.1 seconds.
Across his career, he has handled dozens of rain-affected races with a similar mixture of patience and opportunism.
Fernando Alonso is still racing in F1 today, currently with Aston Martin.
Also Read: F1 Records: Top 5 Constructors With The Most Grand Prix Victories
