For the entire off-season, Atlas F1 brought you the numbers and the story behind the countdown to the 2004 Australian GP... it's now time for the final countdown! Are you ready?

We dedicate this day to the hundreds and thousands of talented drivers out there who have yet to make it into Formula One, who are dreaming of being on the grid one day. Keep the faith, keep pushing, and above all - keep racing!

One is for Formula One, the pinnacle of single seater, open-wheel racing. Since the first Formula One World Championship race in Silverstone 1950, 772 drivers have made it to the big show. 69 of them didn't actually start a Grand Prix, but they took part nonetheless. Of the 703 that started a race, 94 have won one or more Grand Prix. Just 27 have become champions. These are the best of the best.

Two is the number of drivers on a team. Behind every champion there's a teammate who plays an important role. It's quite rare that two drivers stay on the same team for a very long time. Record holders are David Coulthard and Mika Hakkinen, who drove 99 races together at McLaren between 1996 and 2001. Second place goes to Rubens Barrichello and Michael Schumacher, who are still teammates at Ferrari after 67 races. Third are Nigel Mansell and Elio de Angelis, who defended the colours of Lotus between 1980 and 1984 for a total of 61 races, closely followed by Eddie Irvine and Michael Schumacher who were teammates at Ferrari between 1996 and 1999 for 59 races.

A special pair are Jean Alesi and Gerhard Berger. The two were first teammates at Ferrari, where they drove 47 races together between 1993 and 1995. Then in 1996 both drivers moved to Benetton, where they drove an additional 30 races together before Berger retired at the end of 1997.

The most successful pairing in number of points is Michael Schumacher and Rubens Barrichello. The Ferrari teammates have collected 728 points in their four seasons together. They're followed by Mika Hakkinen and David Coulthard who add up to 554 points at McLaren.

However, being teammates isn't only about success. It's also about supporting each other in bad times. The pair that stayed together the longest without scoring a single point were Gabrielle Tarquini and Yannick Dalmas at AGS in 1989 and 1990. The two remained teammates for 24 races. They are in fact the only pair to stay together for more than one season without scoring points.

Peter Gethin came across the finish line in the lead just three times in his Formula One career. This in itself is not very special, since many drivers have led three or more laps. However, one of these three laps was the final lap of the 1971 Italian Grand Prix, making Gethin the winner in the closest competitive race in Formula One history.

BRM driver Gethin started the race from eleventh, moving up to eight in the first few laps of the race. After a short drop back to tenth, he moved up to seventh after twenty laps. After 32 laps he moved up to sixth when race leader Jo Siffert dropped back. Slowly Gethin moved towards the leaders and when Chris Amon dropped back eight laps from the end, the BRM driver moved to fifth place. On the 50th lap Gethin passed both Howden Ganley and Francois Cevert to find himself in third place within a second of Ronnie Peterson and Mike Hailwood.

In an exciting slipstream duel five drivers dodged and dived past each other. After 52 laps Gethin crossed the line as the leader for the first time. The next lap he maintained his position, but a lap later he was fourth as Ronnie Peterson came across the line leading. As the drivers came out of the Parabolica for the final time it was unclear who was going to be the winner. Cevert led, but Peterson outbraked him. However, the Swede drifted to the side, giving Gethin room to slip past him. As Peterson and Gethin moved to the finish line side by side, it was just a matter of centimeters. Gethin won the race by a mere one hundredth of a second.

Since the team started in 1991, Jordan has won four races. It took until 1998 before the first win arrived. In a rain soaked Spa-Francorchamps, Damon Hill secured the team's first win. This happened after one of the biggest pile-ups in Formula One history at the first start, where 15 of the 22 cars were damaged. The only team to survive the shunt without any damage was Jordan. At the second start, Hill took the lead, but after a while had to make way for the much faster Michael Schumacher. However, as Schumacher collided with McLaren driver David Coulthard, Hill inherited the lead and brought home Jordan's first win.

The team's second win came a year later in the French Grand Prix. Heinz-Harald Frentzen was victorious, again in wet conditions. The German drove a solid race climbing into first late in the race after it had previously been a battle between Rubens Barrichello in the Stewart, both McLarens and Michael Schumacher. Jordan's third victory came later in 1999, when Frentzen was the winner in Monza. Starting from second, Frentzen remained behind Mika Hakkinen until the Finn retired after which he was able to keep Ralf Schumacher at a safe distance for Jordan's first dry win.

The team's final win so far was again in an incident packed race. In once again wet circumstances with many drivers crashing out, Giancarlo Fisichella reached the red flag behind Kimi Raikkonen after Fernando Alonso had ploughed into the wreckage of Mark Webber's Jaguar. However, the result of the previous lap counted and Fisichella and Jordan were declared winners of the 2003 Brazilian Grand Prix.

Between 1989 and 1995 Bertrand Gachot scored five points in Formula One. He started his career with the Onyx team but failed to pre-qualify for the first six races. Finally in the French Grand Prix he made his race debut with a 13th place finish. In the final two races of 1989 he drove for the Rial team and in 1990 he joined the Coloni team where he failed to pre-qualify for all the races.

His real break in Formula One came in 1991 with the new Jordan team. In the Canadian Grand Prix he scored two points with a fifth position and in the British and German Grands Prix he finished sixth. After the Hungarian Grand Prix Gachot attacked a London cab driver with teargas and was sentenced to 18 months in prison. The sentence was later revoked but Jordan had already signed a deal with Michael Schumacher. In 1992 he made a comeback with the Venturi team and the only highlight of the year was a point in the Monaco Grand Prix.

In 1994 and 1995 he drove for the Pacific team but the car was not good enough to fight for any points. The closest he got to a point finish was in the Australian Grand Prix of 1995 where he finish in eight and last position.

In 1988 and 1989 the small German Rial team competed in Formula One. In the two years of competition the team scored six points.

In the 1988 season Rial was a one-car team with Andrea de Cesaris as driver. Despite many car failures de Cesaris managed to finish fourth in the United States Grand Prix held in Detroit. His best other finish that year was an eighth position in the Australian Grand Prix.

For 1989 the team decided to go for a two car team and initially hired Christian Danner and Volker Weidler as drivers. The team failed to qualify or even pre-qualify on 28 out of 32 attempts, only Danner managed to qualify four times. Again in the United States Grand Prix but this time in Phoenix the team scored three points with a fourth place by Christian Danner. At the end of the year Rial discontinued its Formula One project.

From his debut in the 1993 South African Grand Prix, Rubens Barrichello has won seven races. All seven race wins have taken place with Ferrari. On the list of race winners Barrichello shares his place with Rene Arnoux, who also won seven Grands Prix.

After 123 races Rubens Barrichello finally won his first race in the 2000 German Grand Prix. Helped by rainy conditions and a protester on track he made his way from 18th on the grid to the head of the field. In 2001 Barrichello was on the podium for 10 out of 17 races but he did not win a race. So far 2002 has been Rubens Barrichello's best season in Formula One with four wins. With the dominant F2002 he won the European, Hungarian, Italian and United States Grands Prix. He was also on his way to win the Austrian Grand Prix but team orders prevented him for winning.

Last year Barrichello was victorious in the British Grand Prix - where once again a protester found his way onto the track - and in Japan, the final race of the season.

McLaren has won the Constructors' Championship eight times, ranking third behind Ferrari (13) and Williams (9). The first championship came in 1974 when Emerson Fittipaldi's driver title formed the basis of McLaren's championship. The Brazilian scored 55 of the 73 points for the team. However, it wasn't until the last race of the season that both titles were secured. An exceptional bad race for both Ferrari drivers, Niki Lauda and Clay Regazzoni, made sure that a fourth place for Fittipaldi was enough for both championships.

It would take ten years for the second title to arrive. In 1984 McLaren were the strongest team by far, winning by 86 points as Niki Lauda and Alain Prost finished first and second in the championship. The next year was less of a walk over, but McLaren still won both championships. With a lead of ten points and both cars out after 57 laps in the final race, it was a tense few laps until the Ferrari of Michele Alboreto broke down, handing McLaren the championship.

Then after two years of finishing second came McLaren's strongest year. With Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost, the team won 15 of the 16 races, scoring a massive 199 points, 134 more than number two Ferrari. It was the beginning of four consecutive championships for the Woking team. After that it was another long period without much success until Mika Hakkinen won the drivers championship in 1998 and with the help of David Coulthard secured McLaren's eight constructor's championship.

In its 21-year history Ligier scored nine wins. The first of these came in Ligier's second season. In the 1977 Swedish Grand Prix, Jacques Laffite kept his head cool after a mediocre start that saw him drop from eight to eleventh. As others before him developed problems, Laffite got further and further to the front. By half distance, the Ligier driver was up to fifth place, helped by problems for both Gunnar Nilsson and Ronnie Peterson as well as a collision between John Watson and Jody Scheckter. While Laffite made his way past Mass, Depailler and Hunt, second place seemed the maximum reachable until Mario Andretti suddenly lost speed three laps from the end. This gave Laffite and Ligier their first victory.

1978 was without wins for Ligier, but in 1979 the team got off to a rocket start with wins in the first two races for Laffite. The small team shocked the grid and woke up the competition. However, before Ferrari overtook the French team, Patrick Depailler gave Ligier its third victory of the season in the Spanish Grand Prix. The next year gave Ligier another two victories. Didier Pironi won in Belgium and Laffite scored his fourth victory for Ligier in Germany. Laffite was again successful for the team in 1981 when he won in Austria and Canada. However, that was the last success for a long time. Only in the 1996 Monaco Grand Prix came another win for Ligier. Olivier Panis was one of the very few who kept his car on the track in a rain soaked Montecarlo. In a race that saw only four cars take the chequered flag, the Frenchman scored his first and Ligier's last victory.

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