Only seven days after the action-packed Austrian Grand Prix, the Formula 1 circus moved swiftly on to Silverstone and the home of British motorsport.
With the collision between Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton fresh on everyone’s mind, tensions were at boiling point throughout the weekend.
Although both Mercedes drivers managed to avoid each other, there was no shortage of action and controversy within the German marque’s camp as Rosberg’s side of the garage came under close scrutiny for several radio transmissions made during the race.
The great British weather also made an impact during the race, creating a race day to remember for members of the paddock and the adoring British fans alike.
With the championship battle between Hamilton and Rosberg down to just one point, Grand Prix Times’ Andy Young brings you five talking points from yet another memorable British Grand Prix weekend.
1. Rosberg and Mercedes under fire for radio infringements
Championship leader Rosberg entered the British Grand Prix fully aware that he was going to be considered by many fans as the enemy, especially after controversially colliding with team-mate and local hero Hamilton last time out in Austria.
However, a repeat of such a collision was exceptionally unlikely after the first few laps on Sunday, as Hamilton scampered away into a dominant lead of over five seconds by Lap 10 once the safety car had returned to the pits.
While Hamilton never looked back in the lead, Rosberg soon found himself under threat from Max Verstappen in the Red Bull who soon muscled himself ahead of the German around the outside of Stowe, much to the great support of the British fans.
For the remainder of the race Rosberg and Verstappen battled for second position, before the German retook second on Lap 39.
However, during the final few laps Rosberg began to lose significant pace to the drivers around him and it was confirmed that a gearbox issue had materialised on his Mercedes with seventh gear in particular.
Despite the new radio regulations which restrict what a race engineer may inform his driver, Rosberg asked over the radio whether he should shift through seventh gear to reach eighth gear. His team replied with several instructions, including “A-firm you need to shift through it [seventh gear]” and “chassis default 0-1.”
This instantly caught the attention of many people up and down the paddock, not least Red Bull team boss Christian Horner who was in no doubt that Mercedes were in breach of the radio regulations, with Verstappen soon being informed that Rosberg was under investigation by the stewards.
Although Rosberg initially ended the race in second position ahead of Verstappen, the German was later hit with a 10-second time penalty which demoted him to third position.
Initially Mercedes were intent on appealing the decision by the stewards, however the next day they removed their intentions to appeal and so the penalty stood.
However, what does the penalty issued to Rosberg say to the rest of the field and how will the other teams react during a similar situation?
There’s no denying that Rosberg’s penalty can be seen by many as a precedent set by the stewards, as a simple reprimand would’ve undoubtedly led to other teams questioning the rule as a whole if a penalty wasn’t going to be forthcoming.
However, is a time penalty sufficient enough in the first place? Think about it, teams will now be weighing up the decision of adhering to these controversial radio regulations.
Imagine a situation where a driver picks up an issue similar to Rosberg’s in the future. The team clearly have two choices: adhere to the rules and watch helpless as their driver retires from the race.
Or they could knowingly break the regulations and assist their driver, thereby enabling him to finish the race, albeit with an investigation from the stewards impending. They would then likely be issued a time penalty which may lead to them losing a position or two, but they still might pick up a handful of points.
Overall the shenanigans over the radio clampdown has reached a breaking point in my opinion. The penalty issued to Rosberg will certainly have not made the teams afraid to break them again, leading to the big question: should the strict radio regulations be abolished altogether? Or should drivers’ be excluded from the race? After all if they don’t offer their drivers any solutions a retirement or a complete loss of points is the likely outcome.
2. Advantage Hamilton after third consecutive Silverstone victory
After dominating the 2014 and 2015 seasons, Hamilton has struggled somewhat during the opening half of the 2016 season to return to his former dominance.
Meanwhile team-mate and rival Rosberg has wasted no time in making the most of Hamilton’s slow start, winning the first four races of the season before the Mercedes duo collided in highly controversial circumstances at the start of the Spanish Grand Prix.
Since that shocking moment in Barcelona, Hamilton has slowly but surely managed to turn his season around. The Briton has won four of the fives races since their collision and double-DNF, closing the gap down to just one point in the drivers’ championship.
In the meantime Rosberg has only secured one victory since Barcelona, with only one other podium finish. At Monaco and Canada the German looked practically a shell of his former self, and there’s absolutely no denying that it is now a case of advantage Hamilton as the sport prepares for the two final races before the summer break after Germany.
When you consider that Hamilton was down in third position in the drivers’ championship after the Spanish Grand Prix, the speed in which he has managed to turn his season around is exceptional and is undoubtedly an example of his sheer brilliance and maturity behind the wheel.
During the early stages of his career with McLaren, Hamilton was renowned for taking one step forward and two steps back. After he secured his first championship crown in 2008, Hamilton struggled slightly thereafter and could only manage a personal best of fourth in the championship on two occasions. Meanwhile new team-mate Jenson Button joined McLaren and practically immediately finished second in the championship in 2011.
It was during this period that Hamilton was engulfed in several skirmishes both on and off the track, including collisions with Fernando Alonso and Mark Webber in 2010, Button and Kamui Kobayashi in 2011, and Pastor Maldonado and Nico Hulkenberg in 2012, not to mention losing his cool and posting team telemetry on Twitter.
But since joining Mercedes Hamilton has slowly but surely matured, and looks set to take the fight to team-mate Rosberg once again this season.
Further competitive results in Hungary and Germany could see Hamilton head into the summer break top of the drivers’ championship and with the momentum well and truly on his side of the garage. Naturally team-mate Rosberg will be desperate to prevent this, but after such an impressive victory on home soil, Hamilton could become even more difficult to thwart.
3. Verstappen overshadows Ricciardo in one of his best drives yet
"Max drove a fantastic race and is continuing to show he's a force to be reckoned with.”
Those were the words of reigning world champion Hamilton after the British Grand Prix, and speak volumes of the impact Verstappen has already had in F1.
It’s easy to regard Verstappen’s drive to victory back in Barcelona as his best drive so far in F1, especially considering it was only his first race for Red Bull after completing a straight swap with Daniil Kvyat.
However, as brilliant as his drive was, there’s no denying that several key factors greatly assisted the youngster in securing victory. Firstly the dominant Mercedes drivers managed to collide into each other, retiring on the spot and essentially throwing the race wide upon.
Secondly both Ferrari and Red Bull elected to commit Daniel Ricciardo and Sebastian Vettel to three-stop strategies, which therefore left Verstappen in the lead ahead of Kimi Raikkonen who remained on two-stop strategies. Admittedly the Dutchman defended the lead expertly to the 2007 champion, but if it wasn't for those key factors mentioned Verstappen could’ve been looking at third place or even lower.
So therefore his superlative driver throughout the British Grand Prix weekend showed not only that he can be consistently competitive at the front, but also that he has no qualms in battling for track position with the likes of Rosberg in what is a far superior Mercedes car.
Not only did Verstappen manage to remain competitive to Rosberg, but he also completed one of the best moves of the season around the outside of Stowe, wowing the British spectators and no doubt gaining a few more fans in the process.
He managed to out-qualify team-mate Ricciardo for the first time this season, and in the process secured his personal best qualifying result in third position.
The British Grand Prix weekend was a classic example of how Verstappen has matured as a racing driver since joining Red Bull, managing to pull off overtaking manoeuvres such as the one on Rosberg with relative ease and not causing any unnecessary contact in the process.
This is in stark contrast to the start of his 2016 season with Toro Rosso in Australia, where Verstappen became practically enraged while stuck behind then team-mate Carlos Sainz, pleading with the team to employ team orders before making contact with him at the penultimate corner.
It just shows that Verstappen’s temperament has also improved, and that combined with his sheer fearlessness behind the wheel of the car is just a glimpse of what the Dutchman has to offer. With Red Bull he has instantly acclimatised to life in a front-running team, and his efforts at the British Grand Prix were certainly one of the best of his short career so far.
4. What’s happened to Ferrari and can they win a race this year?
Ferrari suffered a weekend to forget at Silverstone, as they dropped behind Red Bull as second best to Mercedes. Throughout the majority of the weekend they seemed unable to rise ahead of Red Bull, and at some stages even came under threat from Williams and Force India.
The British Grand Prix was a disaster for Vettel in particular, as the German was hit with a second consecutive gearbox failure which once again resulted in a grid penalty for the race. After becoming the first driver to switch to dry tyres, Vettel’s race failed to improve as he suffered an ominous spin at Turns 1 and 2 and simply looked uncompetitive in all areas.
To cap it off Vettel collided with Felipe Massa while trying to overtake the Brazilian at Turn 3 and was hit with a five-second time penalty, ultimately ending the race ninth.
Meanwhile team-mate Raikkonen looked equally uncompetitive, but still managed to bring home a handful of points in fifth position.
Although both cars did make it to the finish, there’s no denying that fifth and ninth are certainly not what the Scuderia are aiming to achieve in F1. After the Monaco Grand Prix team boss Maurizio Arrivabene stated that he was sure Ferrari could still win the championship, only several weeks after Vettel insisted likewise.
But the reality after Silverstone is that Ferrari now sit 131 points behind Mercedes and only six ahead of Red Bull!
It seems their strategic blunders have been replaced by reliability issues, as after the first race in particular in Australia it seemed that a certain victory for Vettel was scuppered by a poor strategic call during the red flag period following Alonso’s shunt.
Yet further strategic blunders occurred at the Canadian Grand Prix, once again after Vettel enjoyed a tremendous start and took the lead.
When both Mercedes drivers retired at the start of the Spanish Grand Prix Ferrari threw away a perfect opportunity to secure victory, instead losing out to rivals Red Bull.
Since then Vettel has been hit by two successive gearbox failures, while Raikkonen retired from the season opener with an issue on his turbo. Not to mention Vettel’s embarrassing engine failure on the formation lap in Bahrain!
So the big question for Ferrari is can they actually win a race this season?
Given the sheer dominance from Mercedes out in front, it seems it would require yet another blunder on their part for everyone else to get a chance at victory. But then again even if that blunder materialised then there’s no guaranteeing that Ferrari would be the ones picking up the pieces.
As the season has progressed Red Bull has improved at a tremendous rate, winning a race and gradually closing the gap to Ferrari. As much as Ferrari would dearly love to win at least one race this season, their prime aim will undoubtedly be to remain ahead of Red Bull whatever the cost.
In the drivers’ championship Vettel has now dropped to sixth, behind team-mate Raikkonen and both Red Bull drivers. Last season the German secured surprising victories at Hungary and Singapore, something which if repeated would be a godsend for him and his team.
5. Williams vs Force India: The battle for fourth in the constructors’ championship
Since obtaining Mercedes power for the 2014 season, Williams has entered a downward spiral year-on-year, struggling that little bit more each year. During their first season with Mercedes engines Williams clearly enjoyed a boost in results, finishing on the podium on regular occasions and eventually finishing third in the championship, 104 points ahead of Ferrari.
But since then Williams have seemed to struggle significantly, whereas the likes of Ferrari in particular have managed to improve. Last season Williams experienced less visits to the podium than in 2014, and although they ended the third in the championship once again they still failed to secure the overall goal of at least one race victory.
So far this season Williams seem to have struggled even more, with currently only one podium to their name after the first ten races of the season. This leaves them a staggering 106 points behind Red Bull in the constructors’ championship, and only 19 ahead of Force India.
With such a monumental gap to Red Bull with 11 races remaining, Williams must surely be resigned to finishing behind the Milton Keynes-based outfit in the constructors’ championship. Not only do they need to score 106 points in that timeframe, they also need Red Bull to all of a sudden become uncompetitive and practically stop scoring altogether.
Instead Williams must now be surreptitiously looking behind them as Force India begin to emerge as a strong threat to their fourth place in the championship.
While Williams have only visited the podium on one occasion so far this season, Force India have done so twice thanks to Sergio Perez, with Hulkenberg bringing home a handful of valuable points as well.
So far this season Williams have managed to finish higher than their starting positions on eight occasions out of a possible 20, a clear example of how their race pace has dropped dramatically in particular. Even after qualifying on the front-row of the grid in Russia, Valtteri Bottas could only manage fourth and missed out on a podium finish altogether.
A clear example of the team’s recent dip in performance is the fact that they have not led a lap of a race since the British Grand Prix last year, when Bottas and Felipe Massa shocked Mercedes and leapfrogged into the lead from the second row on the grid.
Although it is easy to put the 19 point gap between Williams and Force India down to the poor performance of Williams, one must equally praise Force India for their absolutely stellar first half of 2016, despite a slow start to their campaign.
The team have already finished on the podium twice, and could well make a return to the podium again when the sport reaches Spa-Francorchamps and Monza – two venues which have been happy stomping grounds for Force India in the past.
However, as easy as it could be for Force India to draw level and then overtake Williams in the constructors’ championship, remaining ahead of the Grove-based outfit is a different thing altogether.
One thing is for certain though, and it’s that the battle between Williams and Force India in the constructors’ championship has all of the ingredients of being a fascinating midfield battle. It’s unlikely that Toro Rosso could join them, as they themselves will be keeping a firm eye on McLaren behind them.
