Is Silverstone worth the hype? – British GP Fan Review
Hope Gallagher
On Sunday 9th July my dad and I set off at 4.30am on an almost 3-hour drive to the British Grand Prix. At this ungodly hour I had only one thought–would Silverstone be worth the hype and live up to my expectations. The money, the view, the mixed weather were many of the concerns my friends had raised to me when I mentioned I would be attending the race.
In light of my attendance of the race and the recent race calendar release, over the past two weeks I have found myself contemplating if attending the British Grand Prix is all it’s cracked up to be. Through this review of the GP, I aim to give you an insight into race day; the events on and off the track and ultimately help you decide if it is worth it.
We arrived just before 8am and got the bus from the Park and Ride carpark to the track, considering the amount of people in attendance the queue for the bus was considerably quicker than I’d imagined. When we got there, of course after some time spent queueing which would be a theme throughout the day, we arrived at the Luffield stand where we would be watching the race. When we arrived it was the first stand we saw, it was a perfect stand for those who want to be close to a point of exit for any reason throughout the race day.
Immediately I found myself wishing we’d arrived earlier or maybe even stayed an extra night as we sadly missed a lot of the F3 race and only managed to see the big crash that happened in the race, which lead to all but one of the following laps being raced under a safety car. Upon reflection my dad and I discussed that ideally we should arrive earlier or (if possible) stay an extra day, there is so much to do and see off the track that it is impossible to do in one day.
After the F3 we went to collect our radios, which we had already pre-ordered on the app, costing £15. I thought this pre-arrival purchase was particularly useful as it meant we could hear the race commentary from Silverstone Radio for all the races. Though this is an extra expense on top of the already pricey ticket costs and travel costs we knew this would shape up to be an expensive day. Because of the radio I was able to follow all the drivers and team strategies during the race. However, my dad is not the best at multi-tasking, so he wasn’t able to listen to the commentary and watch the race at the same time, so he didn’t deem this a very worthy purchase. When we arrived home, we actually decided to watch the race again anyway to get a fuller picture of how everything went down on track. It is also difficult to hear the radios when the cars go past purely because of how loud they still are, even in this new era with quieter engines. Overall, whilst this isn’t a necessary purchase and adds to the already expensive day, it certainly helped me to follow all the races.
Shortly after it was time to return for the F2 race. It was evident that not everybody opted to make their way back to the stands for the race, seemingly people would rather take this time to visit the various stalls and activities on offer. I somewhat follow F2, whereas my dad is completely clueless when it comes to the lower leagues, yet this did not stop him from enjoying the race. The F2 provided a good warm up as a great teaser for what kind of action you will see in the F1. It was definitely an interesting race, with a few strong battles going on throughout the field as well as interesting team tactics that even the commentators struggled to predict strategies and sometimes even keep track of the race. Typically of F2, there were a number of safety cars that played to the advantage of certain teams, with Victor Martins securing his maiden victory. The crowd showed a lot of support for Arthur LeClerc. Arthur was certainly the best-known driver on the grid no doubt due to his brother, with the crowd cheering him on in his attempts to cling onto P2 despite eventually finishing the race in P9. Ollie Bearman also gained support when the crowd clocked onto the fact that he is a British driver who scored some important points, holding onto his 4th place in the championship.
After F2 there was another break in the timetable. At this point we were able to explore the off-track events and activities. By the time we located the main Chrome stage we were able to catch the end of the P1 Podcast Live with Matt and Tommy. It was heart-warming to see the pair get to achieve such a feat in their career and to interact with the crowd at an event they were such intense fans of. Shortly after this the Porsche Mobil Race began, however neither me or my dad were too interested in this and at this time of day all we wanted was to find some food, which brings me to the prices. Whilst we queued for the bus to the track, we were warned by one of the workers how expensive food was once inside, as well as being encouraged by many fans on social media to buy food beforehand and bring it in. We did not listen to this advice. The food was fairly expensive (though it could be said similarly priced to bigger events like concerts) and as the day went on, particularly before the main race, the lines for the food stalls were out of hand when stood in high heats.
The issue of pricing carried over into the merchandise stalls where they were selling team caps for £50 (for all the bigger teams at least), something which I had purchased weeks before for my dad for around £30. This was arguably much more unreasonable than the food pricing and this was where I took most of my issues with. The queues for other activities and interactive challenges were also immense, this was particularly the case for the pitstop challenge and the sim racing. Queuing, even for the toilets, is something you genuinely had to factor into your day. Timing is key.
Up next was the drivers’ parade, where the crowd started to really turn out. Before the drivers came the paddock club members were driven around in trucks and boos from the crowd were overwhelming. This was interesting seeing the crowd’s reaction to the wealthier attendees being parading round the track. This was strikingly noticeable as the workers and marshals were given a huge cheer of support for them, to which they reacted gratefully, bringing even more cheers. Another group who got a lot of support were the of course the British drivers, there were big cheers for Lando, Lewis, George and Alex. This was only a teaser for the support there would be for the Brits during the race, but arguably the most popular of the Brits weekend seemed to be Lando. There was a lot of McLaren merch on display throughout the weekend, with Lando on the front row of the grid the crowd were going wild for the papaya team. We were fortunate enough to be in the stand which he and the Sky F1 team stopped right in front of to shoot out some fan t-shirts from his canon (many attempts of which were not successful) and do a small interview which really got the fans excited. However, one driver which did not receive support from the stands was Max Verstappen. The fact the crowd would not support Verstappen didn’t surprise me due to his dominance this season as well as the swarm of Mercedes fans, more specifically Lewis fans, many of whom may still well be upset about the end of the 2021 season. Despite this I did not expect him to get such a strong reaction from the crowd, as something discouraged before even from Hamilton himself, despite Max seemingly unbothered by the situation.
Shortly after followed the Red Arrows display which overlapped with some of the hot laps. This was ideal for the families at the race and was a great display from the pilots. The perfect warm up before the Grand Prix finally began!
Even before lights out the crowd knew we were in for an exciting race, with a British team occupying 2nd and 3rd position. As soon as Lando took the lead the crowd went crazy, something you could hear on the tv broadcast and could certainly feel around the track. Though most of us knew with Red Bull’s race pace it would only be a matter of time before Max caught and eventually overtook Norris, this did not stop us from celebrating the lead he held for several surprising laps. All the support for the British drivers once again was evident here when Lewis moved up the grid from seventh to eventually gain the third-place podium. In addition to this, there were cheers when Russel initially overtook Leclerc, an amazing fight to watch particularly in Luffield, where the overtake took place. Albon in the Williams also showed once again the recent recognition he has been receiving is much deserved with another impressive drive which was supported by the crowd. The atmosphere from the crowd added significantly to the experience and was unlike anything I had expected.
The pace of the cars is truly something spectacular to see in person, the speed at which they go through the turns as well as how short the gap is until you eventually see the drivers again is very little. This speed was of course best demonstrated by the gap Verstappen’s Red Bull managed to pull out over Norris in only a couple of laps. The same can be said about the way Perez utilised the Red Bull’s pace to move up 10 places to finish 6th after another poor qualifying session from him. The pace was one of the main reasons we chose to rewatch the race at home, there was so much high-speed action going on that we missed some key things from the broadcast. We both actually agreed the race flew by, which is not something I always feel when watching the less exciting races at home. From where we were in the stands there were large screens in front of us (though I did have to whip out my glasses in order to see properly). This helped us to see what was happening on other corners, even so you wouldn’t always be paying attention to them thus we did miss some bigger events. Personally, I did not feel this affected our experience and though we missed a few things we knew we had the option to rewatch so I certainly wouldn’t let that factor stop you! In fact, the atmosphere for the race alone more than made up for this.
The race itself was packed full of exciting moments. With the Haas of Kevin Magnussen bringing out the safety car with flames coming from his exhaust and interrupting McLaren’s plans for a double podium and instead aiding the Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton. Piastri still finished an impressive fourth position, showing he is most definitely the best performing rookie this season. Ferrari’s performance under the safety car once again seemed to have left the fans in the stands unimpressed with the strategy choice, an all too well-known feeling for Ferrari fans. With Sainz struggling on the hard tyres after deciding to stay out and Leclerc making little impression after swapping from the hards back to mediums. Alpine are another team who suffered at the GP. With Ocon’s car out early on and Gasly limping back to the pits after the safety car the team were forced to retire both cars and left with 0 points to add to their fight in the constructor’s championship. Of course, in retrospect it is important to note this is the last drive Nyck De Vries completed with Alpha Tauri, coming last ahead of only the retired cars. Clearly his drive left much to be desired from the team, particularly at a track he is familiar with and thus Alpha Tauri opted to replace the rookie with Riccardo after he delivered an impressive test run of the Red Bull the following day.
The race result meant it was Red Bull’s 11th consecutive race win, equalling McLaren as the previous record holders. The crowds booing stopped as Max drove by on the cool down lap despite how tired some fans are of the Verstappen dominance; it was nice to see the World Champion receive some support.
I suppose you could argue it was another boring race as the outcome is the same as always, another Max win. However, I would disagree, despite the somewhat predictable end to the race there was some great racing on display and with two Brits on the podium at Silverstone for the first time since 1999. It truly was an eventful race with an amazing atmosphere and one I’m extremely lucky to have had the chance to witness in person.
After the race came to an end and all the cars were back in the pits the fans were allowed to invade the track! We walked all the way through to the pit lanes from Luffield, picking up rubber from the tires on the way and watching people break down the Heineken sponsor signs to take home with them. We saw the garages of all the teams, as well as the new team garage designed for Brad Pitt’s upcoming film which Hamilton is working closely on. It was an amazing experience to get to walk round the track and see the pits, despite being fenced off and somewhat difficult to see. We saw the grid boxes and the 5 starting lights and where the drivers’ journeys had begun that weekend, ours ended. We walked back to the bus and began our journey home; we spent the time speaking about the day and honestly haven’t stopped doing so since. If that doesn’t tell you how highly I would recommend the experience I’m not sure what will.
With the release of the 2024 calendar now is the perfect time to look at dates for next year’s Grand Prix and tick off a bucket list item of attended a Grand Prix. I’m so lucky I was able to attend such an amazing race and would urge anyone who can to get down to Silverstone to do so for a fantastic day of racing!