Silverstone has made a habit of throwing up some drama, even in those less exciting seasons over the years, and we hopefully had another thriller in store again this afternoon. Max Verstappen started on pole for the fifth successive race as he sought to deliver Red Bull their first win at the British GP since 2012 and help the team equal McLaren’s record of 11 consecutive Formula 1 wins.
The Woking team hoped to have a say in defending their record with Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri lining up behind Verstappen in P2 and P3 after a stunning qualifying performance yesterday, ahead of the two Ferrari men. George Russell and Lewis Hamilton meanwhile started sixth and seventh in their home race and were looking to make steps forward on what has so far been a tricky weekend for Mercedes.
A sell-out crowd was at Silverstone producing a fantastic atmosphere. The pit lane was open so the cars were on their way to the grid. You could feel a buzz around Silverstone as the atmosphere continued to build.
Race strategy was going to be interesting today because the tyres were new this weekend. Nobody had run a 52-lap race on these new construction tyres. According to the computer, drivers could do two stops, maybe play around with the soft tyre, but all the teams were saying a one-stop was the way to go – start on the medium, go to between lap 21-27, put the hard tyre on and go to the end.
Amid Red Bull’s early-season dominance, Mercedes, Scuderia Ferrari and Aston Martin have competed fiercely for podium finishes, and McLaren now appeared to have joined that battle after their upgraded car enabled Lando Norris and team-mate Oscar Piastri to claim second and third, respectively, behind Verstappen on Saturday. While Max Verstappen started from pole for the fifth successive race, in the other Red Bull Sergio Perez was facing a fifth consecutive fight through the field. Once again the Mexican exited Qualifying early yesterday, in Q1 and lines up 15th for the second weekend in a row, promoted one spot after Valtteri Bottas’ disqualification from the qualifying results.
Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur was interviewed on Martin Brundle’s Grid Walk ahead of the British Grand Prix: “When you are starting P4 and P5 you have to be ambitious and you have to target the podium for sure. But it will be a tricky one for sure.” – said the Ferrari boss, the Red Arrows arrived at Silverstone and were putting on a show ahead of their flypast.
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There were 22 cars on the grid at the start of the formation lap, with filming for the F1-inspired movie Brad Pitt continuing ahead of the race. It was the APX GP – Pitt’s fictional team – making its way onto the grid.
You could feel the nerves at Silverstone as the 20 cars left the grid for the formation lap. Getting temperature into those tyres was the key for the start.The only driver in the top 10 not starting the race on medium tyres was Mercedes’ George Russell. Esteban Ocon, starting from P13, was also on softs, while Nico Hulkenberg started on hard tyres in P11, as did Valtteri Bottas from the back.
Lando Norris got the jump at the start from Max Verstappen and led the British Grand Prix as the Silverstone crowd were on their feet. Oscar Piastri was attacking Max Verstappen but couldn’t find a way by as the cars came to the halfway point of the opening lap. Charles Leclerc kept his fourth place. Oscar Piastri took a look at Max Verstappen on the inside of Copse but the Australian backed out.
Lewis Hamilton had a poor start and slipped down to ninth but George Russell got ahead of Carlos Sainz on those soft Alex Albon also lost two positions on the opening lap, dropping from P8 to P10. Verstappen was keeping Piastri at bay and is was setting his sights on Norris, who was one second ahead of the Dutchman: the Red Bull man appeared to be taking time to get his medium tyres up to temperature. DRS was enabled at the end of lap 2.
McLaren was indeed faster than Ferrari at this stage, with Charles Leclerc not able to stay within one second of Piastri in front of him. On lap five, Verstappen took the lead at the end of the Wellington Straight. Lando Norris doesn’t defend, aware that he was not fighting for the win. As we went onto lap six of this race, the top three were starting to pull away a bit from Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari behind. The Monegasque was 2.5s behind Oscar Piastri’s McLaren and George Russell was right on the gearbox of the Monegasque driver. The two nearly touched wheels into Stowe as they dip and dive but the Ferrari remained ahead.
Lewis Hamilton was all over Fernando Alonso. The Aston Martin driver was forced to defend into Turn Three, which gave him a bad exit onto the Wellington Straight and Hamilton got the move done before Turn Six. Sergio Perez managed to get up to P13 but he made contact with Nico Hulkenberg when going past the Haas. The German suffered damage to his front wing and had to come in to the pits for repairs.
George Russell continued to hunt down Charles Leclerc. The Mercedes was staying within DRS range of the Ferrari and Russell had another little look on the run down to Stowe but he was too far back to make a move. Half a second split the two cars as we rolled onto lap 10. Esteban Ocon was the first driver to exit from this race: the Alpine came into the pit lane and the team told him they needed to retire. Sergio Perez went down the inside of Lance Stroll at Stowe to take 11th place. He was picking the cars off one by one and was becoming a problem for the likes of Hamilton, Russell, Sainz, Leclerc and even the McLaren drivers later in the race.
Track limits were a big issue in Austria last week and a fair few deleted lap times were flashing up on the race control screens in the media centre. Including Lando Norris having two lap times deleted in quick succession for indiscretions at Turn 15 and Turn 9. The McLaren driver needed to keep his focus now as he was approaching a warning from the stewards. George Russell resumed battle with Charles Leclerc again: having drifted out towards a second gap, the Mercedes closed up to within three tenths of the Monegasque but again couldn’t find a move down the Wellington Straight. Meanwhile Sergio Perez got past Alex Albon to move up into the point-scoring positions.
Charles Leclerc pitted for Ferrari at the end of lap 18 from P4 and re-emerged in P12 behind Lance Stroll. Meanwhile Ferrari told Carlos Sainz they wanted to move to Plan B, but the Spaniard asks what Plan B was as he’s forgotten. Lewis Hamilton was slowly but surely closing up to the back of Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari in the battle for P5. The Briton was taking a few hundredths out of the Ferrari over the last few laps, and the gap between the two now stood at 1.2 seconds. Charles Leclerc was stuck behind Lance Stroll and Martin Brundle said “the hard tyres were not firing up that well”. However, he finally got by at Stowe to move up to 11th. In second place, Lando Norris was asked how many more laps he could do and replied “I’m happy, it’s consistent”.
Carlos Sainz was told to pit by Ferrari. He came in from P5 and that freed up Lewis Hamilton to press on. Carlos re-emerged in P12 on the hard tyres. George Russell was continuing to go round on the soft tyres having made it to lap 28 before pitting for medium tyres. That gave the Mercedes driver an advantage strategy wise: the hard tyre was proving difficult to warm up and Lando Norris was told the tyre doesn’t look great. Oscar Piastri came into the pits from third place. This was the key phase of the race. On went the hard tyres for Piastri.
Like Charles Leclerc, Carlos Sainz needed a little bit of time to warm up his hard tyres. But they were now up to temperature and he breezed past Lance Stroll to get back up to P10 and into the point-scoring positions. Russell was flying on the mediums and sets the fastest lap of the race. Down towards Turn Six they go, Charles Leclerc defends but Russell goes around the outside with a brilliant move at Luffield (Turn Seven). Safety Car deployed on lap 32 as Kevin Magnussen’s Haas had a fiery engine failure. You lose a lot less time by pitting during the VSC so Charles Leclerc and Alex Albon pit. And the full Safety Car was deployed. Max Verstappen, Lando Norris and Lewis Hamilton all pitted from the front three. Hamilton was now ahead of Oscar Piastri in P3.
Hamilton was running in a net seventh place before those VSC/SC interventions. But was now in third and on the soft tyres. Norris was on the hard tyres so we had a big all-British battle for second on the restart. Unfortunately for Ferrari, Carlos Sainz on the oldest tyres in the top 10, while Charles Leclerc was running in P10, on a Sunday in which the SF-23 proved to be only the fourth fastest car on the track.
The track was clear and the Safety Car was coming in at the end of lap 38. Max Verstappen went for it just before Stowe and opened up a gap, while Lewis Hamilton had a good restart and was on the back of Norris through the first sector. Lando Norris managed to hold off the DRS-assisted Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton on that next lap. And he was now maintaining a half-second advantage over Hamilton. George Russell said the McLarens looked super fast on the hard tyre and Oscar Piastri was going to be looking to come back at Hamilton. Meanwhile Verstappen was saying his soft tyres didn’t feel very good.
Carlos Sainz dropped from P7 to P10 in the space of a few corners: first Sergio Perez dived down the inside of the Vale Chicane and got the move done through Club. Alex Albon then passed the Ferrari on the inside of Abbey before Charles Leclerc got past his team-mate through the Loop.
Pierre Gasly had a puncture or suspension issue. His car was all over the place at the last corner and was limping back round to the pits. Max Verstappen began lap 49 with a 3.4s lead. Lando Norris had to be careful not to breach track limits again or the 5s penalty he would receive would drop him outside the podium places as it stood. Lance Stroll meanwhile got a 5s penalty for a collision with Gasly.
Albon was attacking Alonso for seventh place and the two Ferrari cars were not too far behind with two laps to go, but there was nothing more Charles Leclerc could do, as Ferrari had to settle for a disappointing P9 and P10 in the British Grand Prix.
Max Verstappen won the British GP for the first time and gave Red Bull their first win in the race since 2012. Lando Norris came home second to claim a marvellous podium for McLaren and the Brit in their home race. And Lewis Hamilton maintained his podium streak at the British GP with third place.