Murray Walker is sadly no longer here, but his unrivalled voice is still heard in the ears of motorsport fans around the world.

The Formula 1 icon, who covered more than 350 Grand Prix races during his career, remains to many the greatest sports commentator.

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In fact, it was a title Walker was awarded on many an occasion after he hung up the microphone following the 2001 United States GP.

Two decades later, the proud Brummie has retained his reputation as the voice of F1, having narrated the sport’s greatest moments.

Having joined his father Graham in the commentary box back in 1949, Walker took the F1 commentary reins from 1978 until he retired.

Before his 2021 passing at the age of 97, the Brit hero joined talkSPORT’s ‘My Sporting Life’ for an in-depth look at his career.

Within it, Walker was tasked by host Danny Kelly with the age-old question of picking the greatest driver to have sat behind the wheel.

Motorsport’s evolution during the past century has meant that pitting drivers against each other is a stream of hypotheticals.

Modern cars are faster and more reliable, the tracks that they are driven on are different, and data is incomparably advanced.

Walker told talkSPORT in 2012: “Well, I have to preface my answer, Danny, by saying that this is a subject of unprovable opinion.

“But in my subjective, unprovable opinion, the greatest driver who’s ever lived is a chap that an awful lot of the audience will never have heard of.

“It’s a bloke called Tazio Nuvolari who lived before the war and was a gigantically charismatic, multi-talented Italian who had a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant career.”

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For the uninitiated, Nuvolari was famously called ‘the greatest driver of the past, the present, and the future’ by Ferdinand Porsche  – founder of the company which shares his name.

The former Alfa Romeo and Ferrari star’s 24 Grand Prix victories, which included the 1932 Monaco GP, all predate the existence of F1.

The 24 Hours of Le Mans winner was also the only driver of a non-German car to win a European Championship race from 1935 to 1939.

Nuvolari’s status was such that Juan Manuel Fangio, F1’s first poster boy, helped carry his coffin at his funeral in 1953.

And aptly, the Argentinian was the man Walker plumped for when choosing his F1 goat, over Michael Schumacher and Aryton Senna.

He added: “I’ll say the greatest driver who’s ever lived in the history of Formula One, in my opinion, is Juan Manuel Fangio, who was five times world champion in the 1950s.

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“And he did something that Michael Schumacher, who’s won seven world championships, never did.

“Fangio won the world championship for four different constructors.

“He won it for Mercedes-Benz, for Ferrari, for Maserati, and for Alfa Romeo. And that is a unique achievement.

“He was a charming, courteous, Argentinian gentleman that I had the very great pleasure of interviewing for a whole morning on one occasion.”