Lewis Hamilton has won the British Grand Prix. At his home race, in front of thousands of adoring fans, did Hamilton take his first victory in three years' time. Max Verstappen and Lando Norris completed the podium, and made things difficult for Hamilton until the very last moment.
The race was gearing up to be another very interesting one. The two Mercedes drivers locked out the front row after having beaten Max Verstappen in qualifying. However, Verstappen was dealing with damage to his car and guaranteed us that he could make life a lot more difficult for the Mercedes drivers in the race itself. And then there were of course the two McLaren drivers, both looking to firmly re-establish their status as Red Bull’s closest contender. All five of those could logically challenge for the win.
Someone who definitely could not do that, was Pierre Gasly. The Alpine driver got called back into the pits after the formation lap and would not leave it again. It did give him a great view of Sergio Perez’s Red Bull, who made his start from the pitlane. It was the first and last time Perez did anything of note: the Mexican once again reminded Red Bull of their great decision to extend his contract by finishing in 17th.
The start immediately showed the quality of all the drivers involved. George Russell kept his pole position and stayed in first place, with Hamilton right behind him. The seven time world champion was coming under pressure though from Lando Norris, but the younger Brit misjudged the corner and went off slightly. That gave Verstappen the chance to get through and take the position, with Oscar Piastri right on his heels and Norris hellbent on revenge. The top five squabbled for positions among themselves for the entirety of the first half, until the dark clouds above the track decided they had enough and doused Silverstone in some of Britain’s finest rain. But the difficulty was in the amount of rain: it wasn’t too much, and some sections were completely dry, making it hard to figure out which compound exactly was the best to use.
Norris and Piastri making moves on Verstappen in the opening stages of the race.
Teams fall flat on strategy in the rain
Tricky circumstances where the team’s strategy is crucial for the race result. Shall we check in on Ferrari?
A few races ago, in Canada, the team was presented with a similar situation. It was raining, and the team had to make the call whether or not to put Leclerc on slicks or intermediates. The team decided to go with slicks, just before the rain came down so hard that Leclerc was losing ten seconds per lap. So, have they learned from that horrible strategy call? Of course not. The team put Leclerc on intermediates far too soon while the slicks were still more than quick enough. Leclerc got lapped not much later, and things only got worse from there on. They had put the intermediates on so early, that even when the inters were indeed the better compound a few laps later, Leclerc had already run his set ragged and needed to make another pitstop for a fresh set of inters.
McLaren wasn’t faring much better in the strategy department. When the rain fell down, Piastri was called in a lap too late. His slicks were so ill-suited for the conditions that Norris had already caught up to him again even though he pitted a lap earlier. That completely took Piastri out of podium contention. A bit later, when the track started to dry up, they made the same mistake but with Norris this time. That placed Norris behind Hamilton. Even worse is that they had put Norris on the softs even though harder compounds were better with the amount of laps still remaining.
The fight for the win is still on
Who was on a harder compound was Verstappen, who now started quickly closing the gap to Norris. And with five laps to go, the hammer fell. Verstappen overtook Norris and planted his car in second. Unfortunately for him - and luckily for all the British fans at the track - Hamilton was still too far ahead. It was a good thing, because in all the mayhem of the rain and the pitstops, Russell had to retire from the race with a problem to the water pressure of his car. That meant that Hamilton was now out in front with a charging Verstappen behind him and nobody to act as a rear gunner. But the laps kept ticking down, and Verstappen wasn’t gaining all that quickly.
All the fans were up on their feet in the grandstands. Their cheers and roars made the track shake. Hamilton crossed the finish line in first, his voice breaking with emotion, as the seven time world champion took his first race win since 2021. That emotion was even more evident as he gave his teary eyed post-race interview. For all his platitudes, for all his clichés we’ve heard over the years, this finally felt like we saw a genuine and honest Hamilton who was really grateful for what he just achieved.
| Lewis Hamilton Statistics | |
|---|---|
| Total race wins | 104 |
| Total pole positions | 104 |
| Total podiums | 199 |
| Race wins at Silverstone | 9 |
| Days since last victory | 945 |
And it was very, very well deserved. Congratulations Lewis Hamilton!
Verstappen congratulating Hamilton after the race.
| Position | Driver | Gap |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lewis Hamilton | - |
| 2 | Max Verstappen | +1.465 |
| 3 | Lando Norris | +7.547 |
| 4 | Oscar Piastri | +12.429 |
| 5 | Carlos Sainz | +47.318 |
| 6 | Nico Hulkenberg | +55.722 |
| 7 | Lance Stroll | +56.569 |
| 8 | Fernando Alonso | +63.577 |
| 9 | Alexander Albon | +68.387 |
| 10 | Yuki Tsunoda | +79.303 |