The upcoming British Grand Prix, the tenth round of the 2017 Formula One season, will be the 68th championship event to be held in Britain, the first taking place back in 1950, the first of the new world championship, and went by the name of the ‘Grand Prix of Europe.' However, it will be the 72nd time a race has been run here with the first British Grand Prix actually taking place in 1948. It was only meant to be a one off, as the track was originally an airfield and Giuseppe Farina won the first World Championship race in 1950 for Alfa Romeo.
England actually has a very long and interesting history in the World Championship, and the race has been held at various venues, but Silverstone is known as the ‘Home of British Motor Racing' has been host to 50 of them to date. While rivals at Donington tried to secure a deal with FOM to host the race several years back, the deal fell through and a new revamped Silverstone circuit was born.
There have been some amazing records set here in the past with greats such as Jim Clark who won the race five times, along with Alain Prost, but Clark went one better than Prost with four of his victories being in succession. British hero Nigel Mansell won it four times and set the fastest lap every year from 1986 to 1992. Meanwhile seven time world champion, Michael Schumacher has just three wins to his credit.
In 1973, Jody Scheckter spun at Woodcote, the right hander that leads into pit straight, triggering a multiple pile up. The track had its first alteration in 25 years due to this, and they added a chicane at Woodcote for the 1975 race. This was also the track that saw Clay Regazzoni give Williams their first win in 1979. In 1987, a complex at Woodcote replaced the chicane, and that year Nigel Mansell defeated his teammate, Nelson Piquet in one of the tracks best races. The track was rebuilt in 1991, followed by another major rebuild in 1994.
In 2010 there was a new track layout awaiting the drivers. It became 745 meters longer, making it a total of 5.9 km with an additional five corners to manoeuvre. The fastest lap that year was a 1:30.874 set by Fernando Alonso in the Ferrari, but it was mark Webber's Red Bull that took the checkered flag in first place with Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg joining him on the podium, and no, that was when Lewis drove for McLaren and Nico for Mercedes. It seems very unlikely that Alonso will set the fastest lap this weekend, or stand on the rostrum for McLaren as the Woking based squad continue to struggle with pace from their Honda engine. Also, Alonso could be set to take more penalties for fresh engine pieces as well.
Silverstone is now the third longest track on the calendar and although speeds are increasing this season, there are a few slower sections that were added as a means to increase overtaking.
There have been other modifications to the layout over the years, but it is still a very challenging track with a tricky technical section between Maggots and Becketts where a well-balanced car should be extremely competitive. It is also synonymous of fantastic fast curves: Copse, Stowe and Bridge and where slow corners force drivers and engineers to search for more as the car needs to be set-up to perfection in order to be competitive in each section of the track making it hard to gather up all the necessary ingredients to secure the perfect lap.
One unusual statistic that the British GP is the proud owner of is that it has been won in pitlane, not once, but twice! The first time was back in 1975 when Emerson Fittipaldi was in the pits when he was declared the winner after a hailstorm flooded the Silverstone track and most of the field spun off the track. The second, and most controversial, came at the hands of Michael Schumacher back in 1998 when he came into the pits for a 10-second stop-and-go penalty on the last lap, crossing the finish line in the process before he entered his Ferrari pit box.
After that win, McLaren took victory for the following three years, 1999, 2000 and 2001, the first two by David Coulthard, the last by Mika Hakkinen. This was followed by the Ferrari domination with three wins going the Italian team's way, two from Schumacher, one from Barrichello, before McLaren took back the mantle in 05 with Juan Pablo Montoya claiming the top step of the podium. Interestingly, the 2003 event, won by Barrichello, was plunged into chaos by a kilt-wearing protestor who ran onto the track in the face of cars speeding past at 200 km/h!
In 2006 Fernando Alonso took his maiden victory here with Kimi Raikkonen taking his first win on the famous track in 07. In 08 the wet race was dominated by McLaren's Lewis Hamilton, who became the first Brit since Coulthard in 2000 to win his home event. While many thought Jenson Button would take the victory in 2009, as he had already clocked up six wins from the first seven races, it was the Red Bull of Sebastian Vettel that stood on the top step of the rostrum, flanked by his teammate, Mark Webber.
Webber took the win in 2010 and the following year Ferrari was back on the top step with Fernando Alonso. That race saw the FIA ban the off-throttle blown diffuser, a practice of forcing the engine to continue to produce exhaust gasses to generate downforce when drivers were not using the throttle. Compared to a car with a conventional blown diffuser, the additional downforce produced while off throttle improved grip under braking and in the slower corners while also making the car's handling less throttle sensitive. Some estimates claim that using this system allowed teams to find upwards of one second per lap.
In 2012 Mark Webber was back on the top step once again and it was that particular race that introduced the new format for post-race interviews with the top three, Webber, Alonso, and Vettel interviewed on the rostrum by Sir Jackie Stewart rather than in the interview room which allowed the drivers to address the crowd directly. After the initial interviews, drivers proceeded to the interview room for the official press conference. This form of post-race interviews have occurred at every race ever since.
2013 was the first of the Mercedes dominance with Nico Rosberg taking the win followed by Lewis Hamilton claiming the top step for the next three years.
As we head into the 2017 round, Lewis will be hoping to claim his fourth successive home race victory, his fifth all up, not only to please the thousands of British fans cheering him on, but to help claw back some of the gap to Ferrari driver Sebastian Vettel, who holds a nice healthy lead over the Mercedes driver in the championship standings. However, we can't count out Valtteri Bottas now either. After winning last Sunday in Austria his points tally now is really throwing him into the mix for championship glory, so as we near the half way point, the fight for supremacy could go in several different directions.
For more facts and figures about the British Grand Prix, click here.
