Updated:
Jul 9, 2023 6:11 pm
The Silverstone Grand Prix certainly did not disappoint, Max Verstappen wins his sixth Grand Prix in a row meaning he joins the record books of now 1 of 5 drivers to win 6 races in a row, Red Bull also equal the record for the most wins in a row as a team, 11 wins now in a row for Red Bull as they equal McLarens previous record of 11 which was achieved in 1998, a remarkable record that they will attempt to beat next race week and would certainly go down in history if it were to be achieved.
Despite wet conditions being expected for qualifying and the race, the rain decided not to turn up and the closest we got was a light drizzle and heavy overcast conditions. Nevertheless, despite no rain turning up the race still didn’t disappoint. Kevin Magnussens engine failure triggered the entertainment by allowing Lewis Hamilton to gain a couple of positions via having a pit-stop under SC.
From there on the rest of the Grand Prix was a close sprint, Pierre Gasly making contact with Lance Stroll which caused his a right rear puncture therefore ending his race, following his puncture chaos unfolded as the midfield bunched together which saw the likes of the Ferrari fall down the order and Alex Albon taking advantage over the struggling scarlet reds.
the brits taking over Silverstone
The British certainly didn’t disappoint the fans today with good results all around for the Brits, Lando Norris after McLaren’s superb qualifying secured P2 after fighting off Lewis Hamilton. Lando had an unexpected start as he quickly gained the lead going into Turn 1, leading for a couple of laps until Verstappen unsurprisingly regained the lead. From that point in the race Lando just had to defend and bring the car home, which saw him achieve a podium finish in his home Grand Prix
The same goes for Lewis Hamilton who also got a podium after a well-timed safety car was brought-out which saw him jump from P7 up to P3. After he’d pit and the restart got away he challenged Lando for P2 but with the rapid pace of the McLaren with their new upgrades, it was no match for the Mercedes this week.
Lewis’ teammate, George Russell got P5 for the team finishing behind Oscar Piastri in P4, post race Russell spoke out saying that the McLaren was unsurprisingly quick all race and the pace it had on those hard tyres was shocking. As McLaren put on the hard tyres the rest of the field had softs and mediums on yet despite being on the ‘worst compound’ they were only 0.5 seconds slower then Verstappen on soft tyres.
As for the final Brit, Alex Albon, despite not racing under the British flag and under the Thailand flag, he does feel that Silverstone is also a home Grand Prix to him as he spent the majority of his life living in England and jokes suggesting that he’s only considered British if he gets a good result and when he doesn’t he’s Thai… I suppose this week he’s British as he crossed the line finishing P8.
Alex Albon Making Headlines
Alex Albon has had an unbelievable season at Williams, this years car for them hasn’t been the greatest and if we are honest is pretty poor and fairly undeveloped, however, Williams seem to be brightening up with a whole revamp with getting a new team leader in James Vowles who has taken organisation and development to another level as he aims to get Williams further up the field on a consistent basis.
In Canada he secured an almighty P7 gaining Williams 6 points and today he fought like a lion to secure P8, throughout the race he maintained significant pace to hold his position and in the last couple of laps of the race he had to fend off the likes of Charles Leclerc who’d dropped back after having a poor restart.
Helmut Marko also made his comments on Albon on Saturday evening crediting him on how he has been performing so far this season and even said “Unfortunately he has a contract with Williams until the end of 2025”. Analysing what he said we can first suggest that this perhaps does show that Red Bull are increasingly becoming more disappointed with Perez’s performances and are actively looking for a replacement.
In addition to this, it was widely believed that Albon had a contract with Williams until 2024 not 2025, perhaps a contract extension was triggered behind the scenes which has yet to be announced.. who knows?
But most importantly Albon has now scored 11 points this season for Williams, bringing them up to joint 7th with Haas in the Constructors Championship but Williams will need Logan Sargeant to start scoring some points soon if they really want to be in the fight for 7th.
Ferrari’s Strategy raises concern
It seems to be a never ending ride with Ferrari as one moment they seem like they’ve learned from their mistakes and the next they seem to be struggling once again.
During the Canadian Grand Prix they used a rather strange and questionable strategy which turned out to be brilliant and worked out in their favour. However, today they made some poor choices which saw them come away with P10 and P9 gaining the grand total of 3 points.
One of the first errors made was pitting Carlos Sainz into traffic, by doing this it allowed Lewis Hamilton to heavily over cut Sainz which allowed him to come ahead of him, secondly pitting Leclerc also into traffic wasn’t a wise decision.. but then to pit him AGAIN soon after to get of the hards loosing him even more time is ludicrous.
Changing the tyres again also wasn’t successful as within a couple corners Carlos Sainz went from P7 to P10, Leclerc also couldn’t capitalise on the Williams subsequently meaning P9 was the greatest result he could achieve.
It was believed that Ferrari would have significant pace this weekend and fans widely believed that they would even end up on the podium, so for a low points finish to be achieved is dismal.
During the Grand Prix a London bus was seen in the background, I wonder who that was for?… it was painted red!
