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World champion Lewis Hamilton has edged out Kimi Raikkonen as Formula One’s most popular driver in a global fan survey carried out by Britain’s Autosport magazine and associated publications.

A separate online survey this month backed by the Grand Prix Drivers Association and motorsport.com found Ferrari’s Raikkonen to be number one ahead of McLaren’s Fernando Alonso and Jenson Button.

Both found Ferrari to be the most popular team, followed by McLaren.

Only 35,000 people, overwhelmingly male and mostly in the 18-40 age bracket, responded to the Autosport survey compared to 217,756 who contributed to the GPDA-supported one. Nationality details were not given for the former.

The Autosport survey found Belgium to be the most popular grand prix, ahead of Monaco and Canada, and the 1990s the favourite decade for the sport.

Of the respondents, 37.4 percent had never been to a grand prix and 37.6 of those with no plans to attend cited the cost as the reason.

Asked how much they would be prepared to pay to download or stream live races to a phone, tablet or computer, 43.4 percent were unwilling to pay anything while a further 31 percent would pay less than $5.

As far as rule changes were concerned, 91 percent were against any return of double points for the final race of the season but 61 percent wanted to bring back refuelling. – Reuters.