Casey Stoner
Kenny Roberts
Stat by stat
Bars are scaled to the leader in this list.
The verdict
Casey Stoner leads 3 of 5 categories. Our all-time ranking places Casey Stoner at #6 and Kenny Roberts at #7.
Head-to-head FAQ
Who leads more shared metrics?
How do the published ranks compare?
Are these live stats?
The case for Casey Stoner
Two premier-class titles that most of the paddock rates far above their number. In 2007 Stoner won ten races on the Ducati Desmosedici and gave the factory its first riders' championship; no other rider won a title on that machine until Francesco Bagnaia in 2022, and several world champions failed to be competitive on it. In 2011 he moved to Honda and won ten more races and a second crown. His premier-class record is 38 wins, 39 poles and 69 podiums from 115 starts, with 45 Grand Prix wins in total across three classes. Stoner's distinguishing skill was riding beyond the point where the rear tyre was sliding, controlling spin by feel in an era when rivals leaned on electronics. He retired at 27, at the end of the 2012 season, which is the only real argument against him.
The case for Kenny Roberts
Three consecutive 500cc world championships from 1978 to 1980, the first of them as a rookie, from a career of only 60 Grand Prix starts. Roberts took 24 wins, 22 in the premier class, and 44 podiums, having already won back-to-back AMA Grand National titles in 1973 and 1974 and completed the Grand Slam of victories across all five American dirt-track and road-race disciplines. His influence outweighs his totals. He imported dirt-track technique to Grand Prix racing, deliberately breaking rear traction to steer a 500cc two-stroke, and every rider since has ridden some version of that. Off track he was equally consequential: his threatened breakaway World Series in 1979 forced the FIM to improve circuit safety and lifted rider payments dramatically. He later ran his own team and built his own three-cylinder 500cc machine.