Formula One arrived at the track where the World Championship started back in 1950, Silverstone, for the British Grand Prix.

FRIDAY

Free Practice 1 was delayed a few minutes as the menacing clouds up above opened with a bit of rain. And both Mercedes cars were the first to come out of the pits to do their respective installation laps. They were followed by the Ferrari duo and the rest of the pack. But part of the track was getting wetter and wetter, while the other remained dry, complicating matters a bit. After the first 30 minutes have gone, only 9 out of 20 drivers had set timed laps with Sainz ahead of Bottas ahead of Leclerc. Another 20 or so minutes gone, and Hamilton came out; with less than four minutes left, several cars came out but in the last minute, Lance Stroll went out at Copse corner, which meant a red flag and the end of the session. For statistical reasons only, it was Valtteri Bottas the fastest, ahead of Hamilton, Sainz, Leclerc, and Schumacher the Top Five.

For FP2, the track was completely dry, and every driver took his respective machine onto the track for upgrade and race setup tests. In the end, it was Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz who clocked the fastest lap, a 1:28.942 minutes, ahead of Lewis Hamilton, Norris, Verstappen, Leclerc, Alonso, Perez, Russell, Ricciardo, and Stroll, the Top-Ten, all of them within a second of Sainz’s time.

106 thousand people attended Friday practices.

SATURDAY

It was windy and cold for Practice three at Silverstone, and right on the dot, cars came out onto the track for their first laps. After 10 minutes, only ten cars were on track. Lots of laps from every driver, most with softs (red), some with medium (yellow) tires, but everyone testing different setups not only for the race but for qualifying later on. The last two minutes saw lots of action, in the end, it was

QUALIFYING

There were some menacing clouds in the sky and a 100% possibility of rain from 3 to 4 PM.

Q1

A few minutes before Q1 started, the heavens opened, and rain began to fall on some parts of the circuit. Everybody, except the Alpine drivers, came out early on to set laps before the rain-soaked the track. It stopped raining hard about eight minutes from the end of the session and a dry line was visible on most of the track. In the end, it was Albon, Magnussen, Vettel, Schumacher, and Stroll knocked out of qualifying.

Q2

Tricky conditions as the track was getting worse by the minute, but not enough for full wets, the fifteen drivers posted times on inters. impressive performance from Zhou Guanyu in the Alfa Romeo, but the biggest surprise was Nicholas Latifi, also going into Q3 in the non-upgraded Williams FW44. Out were Gasly, Bottas, Tsunoda, Ricciardo, and Ocon.

Q3

Rain was easing off a bit, although the track was in a sort of air bubble, with rain all around. As with Q1, the Ferrari duo were the first coming out, although the other eight were not far behind. With just 8 minutes left, Max Verstappen was driving on the absolute limit and spun around doing a 360 in his RB18. That enabled Zhou to set the fastest lap at the time. Alonso did a fantastic lap, taking the top spot for the time being. And after a very exciting end of the session, it was Carlos Sainz, in what was to be his 150th Grand Prix start, who took his first-ever Pole Position, ahead of Max Verstappen, Charles Leclerc, Sergio Perez, Lewis Hamilton, Lando Norris, Fernando Alonso, George Russell, Zhou Guanyu, and Nicholas Latifi.

Carlos Sainz became the 104th driver to take pole in Formula One.

SUNDAY

There was a 60% chance of rain at the start of the Grand Prix, menacing clouds all around Silverstone, making it a bit tricky for the teams on how to prepare for the race.

With about 20 minutes to lights out, the Ferrari mechanics discovered an issue with some of Leclerc’s F1-75’s electronics and worked ferociously to get it fixed for the race.

Interviewer: Max, what’s going to be key to winning the race? - Max Verstappen: Finishing first…

The race started with Max Verstappen taking the lead from Carlos Sainz and Lewis Hamilton third place from Charles Leclerc but behind them a big crash involving several cars, including Alex Albon, Esteban Ocon, Yuki Tsunoda, George Russel, and Zhou Guanyu with the Chinese taking the worst part as his Alfa Romeo rolled over at high speed. Obviously, the race was red-flagged. After some very stressful moments, Zhou was taken out of the car and placed on a stretcher into an ambulance to the hospital for further checks. Thankfully not badly hurt.

We tend to forget that Formula One is a dangerous sport, but we must be thankful for the advances in safety measures taken by the governing body, with the halo saving yet another life.

After 48 minutes, the race was re-started, it was a standing start, and since not all cars had passed the SC2 line by the red flag, grid positions were the same as per qualifying, albeit with three fewer cars, those of Russell, Albon, and Zhou.

Brilliant racing for the first few laps. Perez did have a moment fighting with Leclerc for third and lost the right endplate of his front wing, and on lap 5, he came into the pits for a new nose. Meanwhile, Hamilton passed Norris for fourth place. Perez came out in 16th place. Up in front, Sainz was defending from a fast-charging Verstappen behind him and with DRS enabled. On lap 10, Sainz had a moment and went off track, an advantage maximized by Verstappen who took the lead of the race. A bit behind, Gasly and Tsunoda touched and both cars went round, losing several places.

On lap 12, Verstappen ran over some debris on the track and had a puncture forcing him into the pits, coming out in 6th place, handing over the lead back to Sainz, who was closely followed by Leclerc and a charging Hamilton in third.

Verstappen commented his RB18 was not 100% ok and was informed by his team that it was some bodywork lost but that was not critical. He remained sixth.

On lap 20, Sainz was called to the pits, leaving Leclerc in front to defend from Hamilton. Sainz came out onto the track just ahead of Norris in fourth place. Leclerc had some front wing damage in his Ferrari. In the meantime, Bottas had to retire his Alfa Romeo.

By lap 24, Verstappen was called to pit again, changing the tires in his RB18 to hards, coming out in seventh, but was overtaken by Vettel almost immediately. Up in front, Hamilton continued his charge on Leclerc. By lap 25, Leclerc came into the pits, Hamilton inheriting the lead. Leclerc came out in third, behind his teammate, 17 and a half seconds ahead of the Ferraris.

Meanwhile, it was informed that Zhou was declared fit and was released from the hospital after his horrendous crash on lap 1.

On lap 31, Ferrari changed track order and let Leclerc pass Sainz to clear Hamilton from over-cutting them during his yet-to-be-made pitstop.

On lap 34, Hamilton came into the pits for new hards, but had a bit of a slow stop, lasting 4.3 seconds, and coming out in third, but behind Ricciardo on track. Back behind them, Verstappen was struggling in eight and defending from a fast-charging Esteban Ocon. Overtaking the dutchman a lap on lap 38.

On lap 39, Ocon ran into problems in his Alpine, stopping in the middle of the old pit-straight, bringing out a yellow flag and a safety car immediately afterward. Sainz and Hamilton came into the pits, both changing to soft tires, Leclerc stayed out.

On lap 41, lapped cars were allowed to overtake, and the race was resumed on lap 43. And as expected it was a complete reshuffle with Sainz passing Leclerc, and Perez overtaking Hamilton, coming after Leclerc just a few corners ahead. Perez went on for Leclerc and Hamilton passed both of them, then Perez overtook them, and what extraordinary moment these three have given us.

After some extraordinary and thrilling racing, Carlos Sainz wins his first Formula One race, ahead of Red Bull’s Sergio Pérez. Lewis Hamilton finished third, followed by Leclerc, Alonso, Norris, Verstappen, Schumacher (his first points in F1 by the way), Vettel, and Magnussen, the Top Ten.

Lewis Hamilton became the first driver to be on the podium 13 times at the same Grand Prix, breaking yet another record.

This win was the 15th for Ferrari at Silverstone, including the team’s first-ever win back in 1951 with Jose Froilán Gonzalez.

An all-time record of 142,000 spectators were at Silverstone on Sunday for the race, and a total of 401,000 over the weekend, the biggest ever crowd at Silverstone for the Grand Prix.

QUOTES FROM THE PODIUM:

A special message from Zhou Guanyu: