The triple-header concludes
The FIA Formula 1 World Championship season reaches its midpoint with the British Grand Prix, the twelfth of the 24 rounds in 2024, and it does so where its history began 74 years ago. It was on the Silverstone track, located in Northamptonshire and originally built in 1942 as a Royal Air Force military airfield, that the first of the 1,112 chapters of its journey was held on May 13, 1950. That day, the Alfa Romeo of Nino Farina, fitted with Pirelli tires, won the race.
The track features 18 corners and, at 5.861 meters, is one of the longest on the calendar: only Spa-Francorchamps (7.004 km), Jeddah (6.175 km), Las Vegas (6.120 km), and Baku (6.003 km) are longer. It is one of the most fascinating and challenging circuits, especially for the car-tire package. Some corner combinations, such as those from turn 10 to 14 – Maggotts, Becketts, and Chapel – are taken at high speed and generate lateral forces on the tires and drivers exceeding 5g: the average lateral force on the Silverstone track is similar to that recorded on tracks like Spa and Suzuka. This, along with other technical considerations, makes it a tradition, confirmed again this year, that the three compounds selected for this race are the hardest in the range: the C1 as the P Zero hard, the C2 as the P Zero medium, and the C3 as the P Zero soft. The front axle is the most stressed, and the predominance of right-hand corners makes the front left tire the most prone to wear.
The English summer is always characterized by highly variable weather conditions, a factor to always consider as changes can be very sudden. Last year, the race was entirely on a dry track, with the soft tire surprisingly playing a key role: only two teams did not use it. The most used compound was the medium, completing half of the total mileage. The vast majority of drivers opted for a one-stop strategy, although in the past, a two-stop option was also popular.
The 2023 edition saw the debut of a new tire construction, a solution introduced by Pirelli to address an increase in loads recorded in the early races of the season that was higher than the average of the simulations provided by the teams the previous winter. Completely transparent in terms of performance, the construction has proven its validity and will be used until the end of the 2024 championship, despite an additional increase in loads generated by this year’s cars, approximately 10% more than at the end of last season.
Only two Grands Prix have always been present on the calendar of the premier motorsport competition: the Italian Grand Prix and the British Grand Prix. The one taking place at Silverstone this weekend will therefore be the 75th edition, the fifty-eighth held on this track. The race has been held twelve times at Brands Hatch and five times at Aintree. Additionally, in 2020, Silverstone hosted a Grand Prix titled the 70th Anniversary Grand Prix.
Despite the vast majority of teams that have raced in Formula 1 being based in England, the team with the most wins in this Grand Prix is Scuderia Ferrari, with 18 victories. Behind them are McLaren (14) and Williams (10). Ferrari also leads in the number of pole positions (16), fastest laps in the race (20), and podium finishes (59). Among the drivers, the most successful is Sir Lewis Hamilton, with eight home Grand Prix victories, ahead of Jim Clark and Alain Prost, both with five wins each. The seven-time world champion from Mercedes also leads in the number of pole positions (7) and podium finishes (13), while compatriot Nigel Mansell has recorded the most fastest laps in the race (7).
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