@Emirates #Formula1 70th Anniversary Grand Prix 2020 Preview. #F1 #F170

After Lewis Hamilton survived a late puncture scare to win a dramatic race-closing British Grand Prix, round five of the 2020 FIA Formula One World Championship returns to the fast and historic Silverstone Circuit this weekend for the Emirates Formula 1 70^th Anniversary Grand Prix 2020. This is the second back-to-back race held at the iconic Silverstone, which will be a 70-year commemoration Grand Prix of the FIA Formula One World Championship as the circuit, which held the first world championship race in 1950.

 

 

A look at the Silverstone Circuit

 

 

Silverstone Circuit is a permanent racing circuit in England next to the Northamptonshire Villages of Silverstone and Whittlebury. The circuit sits on the Northamptonshire and Buckinghamshire border, with the current main circuit entry on the Buckinghamshire side. The Northamptonshire towns of Towcester, Brackley and Buckinghamshire town of Buckingham are close by, and the nearest large towns are Northampton and Milton Keynes.

 

Silverstone is the current home of the British Grand Prix, which it first hosted in 1948. The 1950 British Grand Prix at Silverstone was the first race in the newly created Formula One World Championship. The race rotated between Silverstone, Aintree, and Brands Hatch from 1955 to 1986, but relocated permanently to Silverstone in 1987.

 

The circuit is built on the site of a World War II Royal Air Force bomber station, RAF Silverstone which opened in 1943. The airfield’s three runways in classic WWII triangle format lie within the outline of the current track.

 

Giuseppe Farina was the inaugural winner of the British Grand Prix which was the first round of the championship in 1950 when the Formula One World Championship was formed and was also the first driver to win the inaugural Formula One World Championship with Alfa Romeo.

 

The circuit layout has changed many times throughout its history on the Formula One calendar with the current front straight featuring the Silverstone Wing pit building which is located in between Club and Abbey Corner has been used since 2011. The current front straight was also used in 2010 while the Silverstone Wing building was being built but the front straight was located at the old pit straight in between Luffield, Woodcote and Copse corner.

 

The current Arena Grand Prix Circuit layout currently being used runs in a clockwise direction and is 5.891km (3.661mi) in length and has 18 corners.

 

Race distance is 306.198km (190.163 mi) with 52 laps in total.

 

Max Verstappen holds the fastest lap record of the current Silverstone circuit layout set last at last weekend’s British Grand Prix with a 1:27.097 in his Aston Martin Red Bull Racing-Honda RB16.

 

A lap of the Silverstone Circuit

 

 

The start of the track begins between Club and Abbey corner. Almost flat out, the right-hander of Abbey leads immediately into the left-hander of Farm before cars heavily brake into the second gear, right-handed turn 3 Village corner. The even slower left-hander of The Loop comes immediately after, and leads into the flat-out left-hander of Aintree, before cars head down the first DRS zone of the Wellington Straight, designed in 2010 to promote overtaking. Turn 6, the left hander of Brooklands, is taken by drivers in second gear and leads immediately into Luffield, another second gear curve; a right-hand hairpin. The right-handed kink of Woodcote leads cars down the old pit straight, before the difficult sixth gear right hand Copse corner, with a minimum speed of 281 kph in the dry for Formula One cars.

 

Then, the equally tricky complex of Maggotts, Becketts and Chapel – a left-right-left-right-left complex with a minimum speed of 209 kph, leads cars down the Hangar Straight with the fifth gear right-hander of Stowe lurking at the end. The fifteenth turn of the track, Stowe, has a minimum speed of 201 kph and precedes a short straight, named Vale, which leads cars downhill towards the Club complex. Heavy braking is required for the left-hander of turn 16, and understeer can be an issue for the next right-handers of turns 17 and 18, as cars tentatively accelerate round to the start-finish straight. You can watch Lewis Hamilton’s blistering pole position lap from last weekend’s British Grand Prix of a 1:24.303 in his Mercedes AMG Petronas Motorsport F1 W11 EQ Power+ around at the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hk5YnZFyINo

 

Tyres

 

 

Pirelli will be bringing with them to Silverstone, the white side-walled C2 Hard tyres along with the yellow-branded C3 Medium compounds and the red-marked C4 Soft rubber as well as the Intermediate (green) and Wet (blue) compounds to the event in case of rain.

 

All drivers will have the same allocation of tyres, eight sets of the softs, three of the mediums and two of the hards.

 

DRS Zones

 

There will be two DRS Zones at Silverstone. The first detection point is 25 metres before turn three (Village) with the activation point 30 metres after turn five (Aintree) on the Wellington Straight. The second detection point is at turn 11 (Maggots) with the activation point 55 metres after the exit turn 14 (Chapel).

 

Pitlane Speed Limits

 

Pitlane speeds will be 80km/h during practice, qualifying and the race.

 

ICYMI: British GP Rewind – Hamilton survives puncture to win dramatic race-ending British GP

 

 

Lewis Hamilton scored a hat-trick of victories and his seventh British GP win despite limping over the line with three wheels.

 

The two Mercedes drivers looked set for a comfortable one-two finish at Silverstone, which was interrupted twice in the early stages following heavy shunts for Haas F1 Team’s Kevin Magnussen and Scuderia Alpha Tauri’s Daniil Kvyat, but their fortune turned on its head dramatically in the final two laps.

 

Hamilton and Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas appeared to pick-up blistering despite their huge gap over Red Bull Racing’s Max Verstappen, and Bottas’ front-left tyre failed on lap 50, which meant the Finn needed to travel slowly to the pits and fell from second to scoring no points.

 

Mercedes warned Hamilton over the radio not to risk taking the fastest lap bonus point on the last lap, but as the Briton ran into Luffield for the final tour his own front-left blew and was forced to limp home with three wheels to cross the line with the tyre barely attached to his F1 W11 EQ Power+ racer.

 

Verstappen pitted after Bottas’ puncture and meant the Dutchman had a 30 second gap to cut down over the second half of the final lap and although he closed in fast, Hamilton just held on to claim his seventh British GP victory.

 

When the British GP began, Bottas looked to have the perfect getaway from second on the grid and drew alongside team-mate Hamilton approaching turn one, but the reigning world champion swept ahead into the right-hand corner and moved clear in the lead.

 

The field behind the two Mercedes drivers scrambled for position throughout the opening lap, with Renault’s Daniel Ricciardo putting in an impressive move on McLaren’s Lando Norris at Copse corner to take sixth, but the race went into caution a few moments later.

 

Haas F1 Team’s Kevin Magnussen moved up from 14^th on the grid but the Dane clipped the kerb at the apex of Club corner hard and lost momentum, meaning Red Bull Racing’s Alexander Albon moved into the apex and the pairing collided at the second apex.

 

The Haas went into a spin and hit the barriers at the exit of the final corner, destroying the front-left of his VF-20 racer, and bouncing back into the gravel trap, with the safety car deployed so it could be recovered.

 

The race resumed on lap six, with Hamilton flying out again in front.

 

The Briton moved out of DRS range from team-mate Bottas over the next few tours, but as the latter looked to be stabilising the gap, the Grand Prix was neutralised once more when Scuderia AlphaTauri’s Daniil Kvyat suffered a nasty shunt into the barriers at the high-speed Becketts.

 

The Russian lost control of the rear of his Honda-powered AT01 as he ran through the fast Maggots quick left, as a result from a right-wheel puncture, and then slammed into the outside wall, sustaining massive damage to his chassis, with debris also scattered over the track.

 

Once Kvyat’s AT01 was cleared, the race restarted on the 19^th lap, Hamilton again lead Bottas and Verstappen clear from the pack.

 

The Mercedes pairing then dropped the Dutchman and were exchanging fastest laps over the next stage of the Grand Prix, with Hamilton and Bottas the only drivers to set best efforts in the 1:30’s.

 

Verstappen continued to drop away but managed to dip into the 1:29’s, still a chunk after the two Mercedes driver done so.

 

The gap between Hamilton and Bottas continued to fluctuate over a second for the next twenty laps after the restart, but as the race reached the final ten laps, the former set a series of fastest laps to increase his lead to over two seconds.

 

Verstappen pinched the fastest lap on the 41^st tour, but by this point of the Grand Prix, the Red Bull driver was over 10 seconds adrift of Hamilton, despite both Mercedes’ tyre wear starting to look grim.

 

But Hamilton continued to increase his lead over Bottas to three seconds, and the gap increased as tyre dramas started to creep in on the Mercedes duo.

 

Bottas was over seven seconds off with five laps remaining, with the closing tours dominated by the staggering development for both Hamilton and Bottas.

 

Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc finished a quiet third place well adrift of Verstappen, with Renault F1 Team’s Ricciardo claiming fourth after McLaren’s Carlos Sainz suffered the same fate as the Mercedes drivers on the penultimate lap.

 

The other McLaren of Lando Norris was running in-front of Ricciardo for much of the Grand Prix but lost out late-on and completed the top five and ahead of Renault’s Esteban Ocon.

 

Scuderia AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly fought with Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel and Racing Point’s Lance Stroll to take what was seventh place, while Albon, who was handed a five-second time penalty for the aforementioned incident with Magnussen, recovered to eighth after completing a two-stop strategy.

 

Stroll finished ninth and ahead of Vettel who rounded out the top ten ahead of the fast-charging Bottas at the final corner. Williams Racing’s George Russell came 12^th at his home Grand Prix.

 

Sainz wound up 13^th with his tyre failure and ahead of Alfa Romeo Racing’s Antonio Giovinazzi who was 14^th and Williams Racing’s Nicholas Latifi 15^th.

 

Haas F1 Team’s Romain Grosjean took 16^th after a controversial drive.

 

Grosjean did not pit after the second safety car deployment, which put him up to fifth and although he dropped away once his strategy trembled, he held a high position for a long time.

 

But his defending against Sainz earned the Frenchman a black and white flag for unsportsmanlike conduct, and he appeared to do it again to Ricciardo on the rundown to Brooklands.

 

Alfa Romeo Racing’s Kimi Raikkonen brought up the rear after sustaining front wing damage shortly before the Mercedes tyre drama occurred in the closing stages.

 

The Situation

 

 

Lewis Hamilton returns to Silverstone on top of the World Driver’s Championship with 88 points and a thirty-point lead over team-mate Valtteri Bottas who is second on 58 points while Max Verstappen is a further 36 points behind the Briton in third on 52 points.

 

Mercedes AMG Petronas Motorsport comes to Great Britain comfortably on top of the World Constructor’s Championship with 146 points and a 68-point advantage over nearest rival Aston Martin Red Bull Racing who are second on 78 points while McLaren Racing is third and are a further 95 points behind the Silver Arrows on 51 points.

 

Click here for the 2020 Formula 1 World Driver’s (Top 10) and Constructors Championship Standings

 

F1 2020 Season Latest News

 

• After the British GP, Pirelli released a report on the tyre failures suffered by Lewis Hamilton, Valtteri Bottas and Carlos Sainz. Bottas’ front-left was the first to blow on the penultimate lap, which saw the Finn fall from second to 11^th. Sainz suffered a similar fate, dropping from fourth to 13^th while Hamilton was able to limp home to victory, despite his front-left puncturing on the final tour. Yesterday, Pirelli’s findings on the failures were as a result of running an unusually long-stint on one set of compounds, along with the increased speed of the 2020 machinery, meaning the tyres were subject to the “biggest forces ever seen in Formula One history.”

 

• After tyre problems hit Valtteri Bottas, Lewis Hamilton and Carlos Sainz at last weekend’s British Grand Prix, sole-tyre supplier Pirelli have confirmed that tyre pressures will be changed for this weekend’s 70^th Anniversary Grand Prix, also held at Silverstone. There was a concern that the move to softer compounds might have to be re-thought due to the tyre punctures on Sunday, but Pirelli said the change will go ahead – though they would be changing the minimum tyre pressures. Pirelli F1 Tyre Chief Mario Isola confirmed front tyres will go up by 2psi and 1psi for the rears. Teams will be running 27 psi for the fronts and 22 psi for the rears.

 

The Emirates Formula 1 70^th Anniversary Grand Prix 2020 weekend begins Friday August 7 with Free Practice 1 and 2, followed by Free Practice 3 and Qualifying Saturday August 8 along with the 52 lap Race Sunday August 9.