Red Bull Motorsports
F1
The Formula One drivers who've mastered the art of social media
F1's crème de la crème aren't just competing on the circuit these days. They're also doing battle on social media as creators of quality content. But which driver is top dog of Twitter and Instagram?
For the modern-day F1 driver it isn’t enough to simply clock up the miles in testing, nail the apexes in qualifying, and score points come race day. Modern F1 drivers are also competing to be at the top of the social media tree.
These seven F1 drivers manage to balance ticking the commercial branding boxes with genuinely sweet, funny and insightful social posts that take us behind the velvet curtain and make F1 that bit more human.
Kimi Räikkönen
Instagram: @Kimimatiasraikkonen
Followers: 1.3 million
From social media zero to hero, 2007 F1 World Champion Kimi Räikkönen has shed his monosyllabic and enigmatic aura and given fans access to his inner circle via Instagram.
Since his first post in December 2017, the Finnish ace, once lauded for his indifference to media commitments and his hilariously blunt mid-race radio communications, has thawed out his Iceman image. It turns out the Alfa Romeo Racing driver is a big old softie.
Followers can see Kimi sharing a laugh with actor Hugh Grant, sledging with his kids, playing ice hockey and generally looking happy and at ease. It's enough to warm the coldest hearts.
Nico Hülkenberg
Instagram: @hulkhulkenberg
Followers: 522,000
Renault’s Nico Hülkenberg is a top driver. He’s won Le Mans and he claimed an F1 pole position in his debut season back in 2010. But after eight full seasons in F1, the Hulk is yet to set foot on an F1 podium.
Hülkenberg is at the top of his game, however, when giving fans a genuinely fun glimpse into life via his Twitter (796,000 followers) and Instagram feeds.
Sure, there’s plenty of gym-based training posts, but that's not all. The amiable German will snap everything from a day out falconeering to living it up on the beach, and even reinvented the "F1 driver hard at work" post with that video of himself chasing a bar of chocolate being dangled from the back of a moving golf buggy.
Lewis Hamilton
Twitter: @LewisHamilton
Followers: 5.42 million
No list of F1 social media masters is complete without five-time F1 world champion Lewis Hamilton. After all, the Mercedes driver has about 15 million followers across Instagram (9.6 million followers) and Twitter. That’s double the population of Tokyo.
As you would expect from a man who is keen on tattoos, dogs, music, high-end fashion and schmoozing with stars, Hamilton's followers are given a glimpse into the life of a proper celeb.
From dirt biking with Justin Bieber to surfing, skydiving and golfing, there's never a dull moment in the online world of #LH44.
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Pierre Gasly
Twitter: @PierreGASLY
Followers: 106,000
Red Bull Racing’s newest recruit isn’t the most flamboyant of social media posters – yet! – but dig deep into the Frenchman’s posts and there’s the solid basis for a bright future as one of the greats of social media promotion.
The former Toro Rosso man’s Instagram (361,000 followers) and Twitter accounts are laden with images of a young man having fun, a winning smile never far away. Obviously that young man is happy because he's 23-years-old, has the keys to the new RB15 and is tipped to be a future F1 champion.
Daniel Ricciardo
Instagram: @danielricciardo
Followers: 1.8 million
After seven Grand Prix wins in five years with Red Bull Racing, the hugely popular Daniel Ricciardo, aka "the Honey Badger", has made the move to Renault for 2019. But a change of employer won’t curb his wonderful social media form.
As one would expect from a man who drinks champagne from a shoe, Ricciardo’s fun-loving, laidback Aussie personality is reflected perfectly in his Twitter (1.58 million followers) and Insta posts. Rarely does he post videos of leg day at the gym.
Highlights include his in-car selfie video singing along to a Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds track (Ricciardo has impeccable music taste), doing yoga at 40,000ft and showing the world that top-class athletes can still have a sense of humour.
Lando Norris
Instagram: @landonorris
Followers: 192,000
Even before the British teenager was announced as Carlos Sainz Jr's team-mate at McLaren, 2017's European Formula 3 Champion Lando Norris was already quite the inventive social media user. And for his debut F1 season, he has a new trick up his nomex-clad sleeve: the LandoLOG.
The LandoLOG is Norris’s YouTube channel. It has over 25,000 subscribers so far and offers a unique glimpse into a driver’s life. Sure, there's gym-based footage, just to prove that F1 drivers do some real work, but, overall, it pitches up somewhere between exclusive insight and youthful enthusiasm.
If the McLaren MCL-34 behaves, we should see some great videos from Norris in 2019.
Fernando Alonso
Instagram: @fernandoalo_oficial
Followers: 2.3 million
The double world champion may have left F1 to tackle the World Endurance Championship, the IndyCar Series and who knows what else in the quest for the hallowed "triple crown", but Alonso still finds time to flex is social media muscles.
Building on solid viral form since that iconic 2016 deckchair pose, the Spanish F1 legend has developed a social media bromance with US-based sports car ace and prolific social media prankster Jordan Taylor.
The pair raced a Cadillac together and won the Daytona 24 Hours. More importantly, though, they cooked up some excellent japes, including a team-mate's marriage proposal, suspect dance moves, and the continuing story of Taylor’s alter-ego, Rodney Sandstorm.
