Hamilton 'Most Marketable' F1 driver, Leclerc finishes above Verstappen

Best 'to sell' athlete

SportsPro and NorthStar have jointly compiled a list of the athletes with the most market value. The athletes are given a 'marketability score' based on three factors: brand strength, audience and reach and economics. The score for each component is added together to arrive at a complete list.

Ronaldo comes out on top with a score of 91.21. In the areas of audience and reach (50) and economics (30), he scores the highest possible number of points. In terms of brand strength, which also looks at current performance, the Portuguese scores 11.21 out of a possible 20 points.

Many F1 drivers

Hamilton is the highest-ranked F1 driver in third place. The Briton scores the maximum number of points (20) on fire strength, but due to lower scores on the other two factors, ends up with a final score of 64.58. As a result, he also has to beat Serena Williams.

Surprisingly, it is not the two-time world champion Verstappen, but Leclerc who is the second racing driver we find in this list. Leclerc loses out on economics compared to Verstappen (5.06 to 11.50), but brand strength (12.89 to 6.65) and audience and reach (16.72 to 14.03) are in the Monegasque's favour. The fact that Verstappen is not a model citizen does not help his brand strength and his lack of frequent media use will cost him points on audience and reach. As a result, we find Leclerc at P25 with a total of 34.67 points, and Verstappen is in 33rd place with a score of 32.18.

The top 100 of this list includes five more F1 drivers. George Russell (P35 with 30.77), Sergio Perez (P36 with 30.70), Fernando Alonso (P59 with 25.59), Carlos Sainz (P68, et 23.60) and Daniel Ricciardo (P82 with 20.21) also made it to the list.