Analysis: Things we learned from the British Grand Prix

Last Sunday’s British Grand Prix saw Max Verstappen collect his eighth victory of the season, but two British drivers Lando Norris and Lewis Hamilton delighted the home crowd with surprise podium finishes. F1Technical’s senior writer Balázs Szabó reflects on the British Grand Prix.

Dominance – Red Bull secured their tenth win of the season and their 11th consecutive victory which saw them achieve McLaren all-time record of 11 consecutive F1 wins. It was the 102nd F1 triumph for Red Bull Racing, their 249th podium finish, 91st fastest lap while the qualifying session saw them secure their 90th pole position.

Successful weekend – Following a difficult Austrian Grand Prix, Mercedes strengthened their position in the Constructors’ Championship by securing a third and fifth-place finish with Lewis Hamilton and George Russell respectively.

The German outfit occupies second place in the standings and are now 22 points clear of Aston Martin with Ferrari a further 14 points behind.

Unexpected success - McLaren had not completed a single lap inside the top five this season until last weekend's Austrian Grand Prix, and they could further cement their improved pace with their heavily-updated car.

The team was embedded in a battle with Alpine for P5 in the Constructors’ Championship, and with both Alpine drivers having retired in the race, McLaren could overtake the Anglo-French outfit and now lie 12 points ahead of them.

Tyres - As for the performance of the different compounds, each of them showed great durability with no significant drop off.

Alfa Romeo’s Valtteri Bottas racked up the highest number of laps on the hard compound with the Finn completing a 32-lap stint on the white-walled tyres. McLaren’s Lando Norris set the fastest lap on this compound on Lap 43 with a time of 1m30.543s as he was eager to cling on to P2, defending his position from seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton.

On the yellow-banded medium, the longest stint was a 33-lap run with four drivers – Lewis Hamilton, Fernando Alonso, Lando Norris and Max Verstappen - having achieved this extremely long stint. The fastest lap was recorded by George Russell, who went on to post a 1m31.124s on the 13th lap of his second stint.

The longest stint on the C3 compound belonged to Russell, who extended his opening stint until Lap 28, showing great consistency on the softest available compound. The Briton was also able to pick up his pace when Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc pitted for new tyres early on which gave the Mercedes driver free air. Race winner Verstappen set the fastest lap on the C3 compound with a 1m30.275s on Lap 42 which became the fastest lap of the race.

Driver of the day – Following a difficult start to the season, Lando Norris secured a fourth-place finish at the Austrian Grand Prix before grabbing his first podium finish of the year at the British Grand Prix. Having made a jump on Max Verstappen off the line, he led the first four laps of the race, but he could not retain that lead over the Red Bull.

However, his first podium at Silverstone was still enough for Norris to earn the title of Driver of the Day after receiving 45.5 per cent of the votes. Scoring 12.1 per cent of the votes, Lewis Hamilton finished in P2 ahead of McLaren’s Australian driver Oscar Piastri (10.8 per cent).

Fastest lap – Max Verstappen achieved the eighth hat-trick weekend of his career (win/pole/fastest lap) at the British Grand Prix. The Red Bull Racing driver set his own best lap time on Lap 42 on Pirelli’s soft compound with a time of 1m30.275s which became the fastest lap of the race.

Confirming McLaren’s resurgence at Silverstone, Lando Norris set the second fastest lap only two tenths of a second adrift of Verstappen’s benchmark. Even more impressive was the fact that the Briton achieved this on Pirelli’s Hard compound opposed to Verstappen’s Soft tyres.

Leaving it late as far as the fastest times were concerned, Haas driver Nico Hulkenberg and Alfa Romeo racer Valtteri Bottas set their best lap times on the last lap of the 52-lap race, but Tsunoda, de Vries, Leclerc, Sainz also achieved their quickest lap in the dying minutes of the grand prix, demonstrating the durability of Pirelli's tyres around the otherwise extremely demanding Silverstone track.

Reprimand for the home hero - Lewis Hamilton left it also late in the Thursday FIA press conference. The stewards launched an investigation into the matter, but concluded that Hamilton’s late attendance was down to his busy schedule in his home race, and handed out only a reprimand to Mercedes.

Pit lane – McLaren was not only quick on track, but they displayed great off track performance as well. The mechanics of the Woking-based outfit serviced Norris’ car in 2.23s under immense pressure during the Safety Car period.

Following two races in which they finally demonstrated encouraging race pace, Ferrari endured a dip in performance in Silverstone. However, the Scuderia was quick in the pit lane as they swapped tyres on Charles Leclerc’s car within 2.32s and required only 2.41s to change tyres on Carlos Sainz’s car.

After 10 rounds in the 2023 F1 season, Red Bull find atop of the DHL Fastest Pit Stop Award with Ferrari occupying the second spot. McLaren made a jump to P3 with their impressive performance in Silverstone.

Disqualification – Alfa Romeo’s Valtteri Bottas was disqualified from the qualifying session after his team was unable to provide a 1.0 litre sample of fuel. Although the stewards heared from the team representative, they found no mitigating circumstances and decided to disqualify the Finn driver.

The last time a driver was disqualified was Sebastian Vettel, who lost second-place finish at the 2021 Hungarian Grand Prix after his former team Aston Martin could only provide a 0.7 litre sample of fuel following the Budapest race.

Fine – The rain-hit qualifying session prompted drivers and teams to fight for the perfect track position. In these tense circumstances, stewards handed AlphaTauri a €5,000 fine for an unsafe release as Nyck de Vries was sent into the path of McLaren’s Oscar Piastri.

Curfew – F1 teams have some very strict rules on when they're allowed to work on the car over a race weekend. Operational personnel are currently subject to three curfews on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday evenings, but they have two jokers during the year which allows them to work on a car in case of an emergency situation.

After detecting electrical issues on Charles Leclerc’s car which prevented him from any running in FP2, Ferrari mechanics were forced to stay in the garage during the restricted period to prepare the Monegasque’s car for Free Practice 3. This was Ferrari’s first individual exceptions during the 2023 F1 season.