Talking points ahead of the British Grand Prix
Thursday, 6 July 2023
F1® returns to a familiar setting at Silverstone for what is a home race for so much of the grid; can anyone on that grid stop Red Bull from equalling one of the sport's most enduring records?
Formula 1® goes back to where it all began this weekend for the annual running of the British Grand Prix (July 7-9), with the 1089th race in world championship history being held at the same venue as race number one, 74 years ago.
The famous old British World War 2 airfield has undergone plenty of change since Italian Nino Farina led an Alfa Romeo clean sweep of the podium on May 13 1950, with the current iteration of the 5.891km track used continuously since 2011. The corner names alone – Brooklands, Luffield, Woodcote, Copse, Stowe – instantly bring back memories of yesteryear, while the sweeping Maggotts-Becketts-Chapel sequence has stood the test of time as a place where F1® cars are truly in their element.
Here's three talking points to keep your eyes on this weekend.
Red Bull has to snap hoodoo for history
By winning the Austrian Grand Prix with Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing didn't just strengthen their stranglehold on this year's drivers' and constructors' titles – it set a new benchmark, winning for the 10th straight time dating back to last season's final race in Abu Dhabi.
Red Bull had won nine races twice before – when Sebastian Vettel was victorious in the final nine races of 2013 and again last year from France to Mexico – but had never cracked double-figures until Verstappen's seventh win of 2023. It's the fifth time a team has won 10 straight races in the chase for McLaren's all-time record of 11 in a row set in 1988, when Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost were almost untouchable.
Mercedes won 10 straight Grands Prix three times – from Japan 2015 to Russia 2016, from Monaco to Singapore in 2016, and again from Brazil 2018 to France 2019. Verstappen snapped the first streak with his maiden F1 win (Spain 2016), while Daniel Ricciardo broke the second one with victory in Malaysia that same season. In 2019, it was Verstappen again who denied Mercedes an 11th successive triumph when he won in Austria.
Ferrari had its own 10-race streak (from Canada to Japan 2002) before McLaren's David Coulthard ended the red team's run when he won the 2003 Australian Grand Prix.
The Senna/Prost superteam's streak has lasted 35 years and survived being equalled four times; is Silverstone where Red Bull ties one of the sport's most revered records? Something to consider: a Red Bull driver hasn't won the British Grand Prix since Mark Webber in 2012
Piastri's optimistic position
For a driver who had spent 36 laps running last in Austria and finished 16th, Oscar Piastri had a smile – however slight – beneath his exasperated visage at the Red Bull Ring last Sunday. Why? Because of what was set to happen, not what just did.
McLaren brought a significant upgrade to its so-far underwhelming MCL60 chassis to Austria, but only had enough parts to introduce it on Lando Norris' side of the garage. The heavily-modified car featured revised sidepod inlets, halo, floor, engine cover and cooling louvres – and it transformed Norris' season, the Briton classified fourth after Ferrari's Carlos Sainz was penalised for repeated track limits infringements.
Norris has proven to be something of a Red Bull Ring master in his F1® tenure – two of his six podiums have come at the Styrian circuit – so it's easy to apportion at least some of his season-best showing to being in his element at a track he's shone at before. But Piastri has seen what the revised MCL60 can do, and gets his own chance in the rebooted machine this weekend as McLaren looks to get back on par with Alpine, who it has fallen adrift of this year to drop to sixth in the constructors' standings.
The race for second place …
Speaking of the constructors' standings, forget first – Red Bull (377 points) has more points than second-placed Mercedes and third-placed Aston Martin combined. But the race for best of the rest is tightening up, with Mercedes, Aston and Ferrari split by just 24 points, and all on different trajectories.
Second for Charles Leclerc in Austria saw Ferrari outscore their rivals for runner-up status for the second race running, after Leclerc and Sainz both banked solid points in Canada one race prior.
At Mercedes, Lewis Hamilton and George Russell have combined to see the Silver Arrows to second, while Aston Martin – despite Fernando Alonso's consistency that sees the veteran Spaniard trail only Red Bull's Verstappen and Sergio Perez in the drivers' standings, continues to carry a disproportionate load for the green team, Lance Stroll (44 points) scoring just 25 per cent of the points for his father's squad (by contrast, Russell has 40 per cent of Mercedes' total, while Leclerc has contributed 47 per cent to Ferrari's tally).
After five podiums in the opening six races, Alonso has just one rostrum (second in Canada) in the past three Grands Prix. Aston Martin's feel-good story of fighting the might of Mercedes and Ferrari for second might depend on the 41-year-old sustaining his form for the whole season.
The Formula 1® British Grand Prix 2023 will be available to watch live on Foxtel and Kayo. See our What time does the 2023 British Grand Prix start in Australia article for timings.
