Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport: 125 Years of Motorsport.

The 1937 Mercedes-Benz W 125 and the 2019 Mercedes-AMG F1 W10 on the track in Silverstone
PHOTO CREDIT: Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport

Exactly 125 years ago today, the first-ever motorsport event was held. In honour of this milestone, we're taking a look at some of the most important events in our racing heritage. 

125 years ago: the birth of motorsport 
In the morning of July 22, 1894, 125 years ago to the day, 21 brave drivers lined up their vehicles on the Boulevard Maillot, right next to the Bois de Boulogne in Paris. Starting at 8 o'clock, the soon-to-be racers and a number of passengers in their cars would compete in the first-ever automobile race - an endurance race, held on 127 kilometres of public roads from Paris to Rouen. 

Thousands of spectators came to witness the event and made the start quite a tricky affair as the roads had not been closed to the public. A report later read: "The convoy is led, flanked and pursued by numerous cyclists, also by a number of vehicles with a mechanical propulsion system which are tackling the route as amateurs." 

The event was organised by the French newspaper "Le Petit Journal" and the regulations were worded in rather broad terms, promising victory to a horseless carriage that was "not dangerous, easy to drive, and cheap during the journey". 

This Peugeot with a Daimler engine was awarded the joint first place
 in the world's first-ever car race.
PHOTO CREDIT: Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport

After a mid-race lunch break in Mantes, the first car arrived at the finish line at 17:40, followed in due course by 16 more vehicles that completed the race. Nine of the 17 finishers were powered by 3.5 horsepower (2.6 kW), two-cylinder V-engines that had been invented by Gottlieb Daimler and were manufactured in France according to his original plans. A 5 hp (3.7 kW) Benz vehicle was also among the finishers of the race. 

The first prize was given to the competitors "whose car comes closest to the ideal" outlined in the regulations and was shared between two French car manufacturers, Panhard & Levassor and Peugeot. Both vehicles were driven by the "Système Daimler" - Gottlieb Daimler's 3.5 horsepower engine. 

In their verdict, the jurors emphasised Daimler's innovation: "The Daimler engine, developed by a skilled engineer from Württemberg; Mr Daimler - who was present yesterday in Rouen to share in the triumph of his work - has turned petroleum or gasoline fuel into a practical solution." 

120 years ago: the name Mercedes in motor racing circles 
In the end of the 19th century, a wealthy businessman named Emil Jellinek became the best customer of Gottlieb Daimler's car company, the Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft (DMG). He ordered his first Daimler car in 1897 and took delivery of two more vehicles in the following year. In 1899, DMG had already supplied Jellinek with ten cars, and in 1900, with as many as 29. 

Jellinek used many of the vehicles to compete in car races. In March 1899, he competed in the prestigious Nice Race Week in a Daimler "Phoenix" racing car. However, he did not participate under his real name; instead, he entered the race under the pseudonym Mercédès, the first name of his eldest daughter, Mercédès Jellinek. Emil Jellinek would continue to use the pseudonym at races and the name "Monsieur Mercédès" was commonly heard in motoring circles. 

In April 1900, Jellinek and DMG signed an agreement for the order of new cars which were to be built to Jellinek's specifications and powered by a newly designed engine that was to be called "Daimler-Mercedes". On December 22, 1900, Jellinek took delivery of the first vehicle with the new engine - a 35 hp (26kW) racing car with a low centre of gravity, a lightweight but powerful engine and a honeycomb radiator, developed by DMG chief engineer Wilhelm Maybach. The car could reach top speeds of up to 90 km/h and is today regarded as the first modern automobile - and the first ever Mercedes. A few months later, this new type of car won virtually every contest it competed in at the Nice Race Week 1901, making the first Mercedes a true race car. DMG began marketing cars with the Mercedes designation in 1901 and lodged the designation as a tradename on 23 June 1902. 

85 years ago: the birth of the Silver Arrow 
In the beginning of the 20th century, Grand Prix race cars used to be painted in the international auto racing colours. Those colours represented the origin of the car or the driver. British teams would compete in "British Racing Green", French vehicles were painted in "Bleu de France" and Italian teams painted their cars red. Mercedes-Benz Grand Prix race cars were traditionally painted white, representing the German origin of the brand. 

According to the legend of the Silver Arrows, this all changed in the 1930s. The Eifelrennen, held on 3 June 1934 at the Nürburgring, was the first race in which the Mercedes-Benz W 25 competed. The car was a newly designed race car for the 1934 Grand Prix season, which saw the introduction of a new set of regulations that limited the total weight of the car to 750 kilograms without fuel, oil, coolant, and tyres. Apart from the maximum weight the regulations left a lot of room for innovation, not restricting the design of the car in any other way. The Mercedes-Benz W 25 followed a classic vehicle architecture; the rear-wheel drive car was powered by a supercharged 3.4-litre in-line 8-cylinder engine that was mounted in the front and produced an output of 354 hp (260 kW).

It was a mighty race car, but according to Silver Arrows legend there was one small issue with it: when the W25 was weighed the day before its first race, it was slightly above the weight limit of 750 kg. Allegedly, the team was able to bring the weight down to within regulatory limits by scraping off its white paint. Without the white paint, the metal bodywork of the car was exposed, giving it a silver look: the first Silver Arrow was born. 
 

The first Mercedes - the Mercedes 35 HP
PHOTO CREDIT: Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport

However, the W 25 would not only become known for its shimmering bodywork, but also for its impressive on-track performance. Manfred von Brauchitsch won the Eifelrennen in the W 25 the following day, breaking the track record with an average speed of 122.5 km/h. It was the first of many wins for the Silver Arrows. The W 25 would compete until 1937, the last year of the 750-kg formula. From 1934 to 1937, the vehicle design was constantly modified in the hunt for more performance. Within three years, the engine displacement increased to a maximum of 4.7 litres, raising the output to 646 hp (475 kW). Many famous racing drivers competed in the W 25, among them Rudolf Caracciola and Luigi Fagioli. 

65 years ago: entering Formula One 
In 1954 Mercedes-Benz made its Formula One debut. Since the start of the 20th century, the brand had built a reputation for developing strong and reliable race cars, so the expectations were high. However, entering a new racing series is never an easy thing to do - especially when you arrive a few years late to the party and renowned competitors such as Ferrari and Maserati had already won races in the series or even championships. 

The new car had a few tricks up its sleeve though and when it was finally time to enter its first race - the French Grand Prix, held on 4 July 1954 in Reims - the W 196 showed what it was capable of. In the hands of Juan Manuel Fangio, Mercedes-Benz won its first ever Formula One race. 

In its early 1954 spec, the W 196 was powered 2.5 litre, inline 8-cylinder engine with an output of 256 hp (188 kW) and came in two different body styles. There was the classic monoposto with open wheels that looked relatively similar to other Grand Prix racing cars of its time. And then there was the famous "streamliner", a car that was aerodynamically optimised to reduce drag and therefore extremely strong on circuits with few corners and long straights. Although the streamlined version has since become an icon of motorsport history, it was actually the monoposto that competed in more races. 

Mercedes-Benz stayed in Formula One for two seasons and won nine out of the twelve races in which they competed. Eight of those were won by Juan Manuel Fangio who also won the World Championship in 1954 and 1955 driving the W 196. In his first year, Juan Manuel Fangio raced alongside Karl Kling and Hans Herrmann, both of which claimed a podium in the season, as well as Hermann Lang. In the following year, Stirling Moss, André Simon, Piero Taruffi joined the team; with Moss being the only other driver alongside Fangio who won an F1 race in a Mercedes in the 1950s. 

25 years ago: Returning to Formula One as an engine manufacturer 
In 1994, 39 years after Mercedes-Benz had last competed in Formula One, the brand officially returned as an engine manufacturer for the Sauber team. The partnership was built on previous achievements racing sports cars, which saw Sauber-Mercedes win the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1989 and the World Sports Prototype Championship in 1989 and 1990. When Sauber made its F1 debut in 1993, its Brixworth-built engine was labelled "Concept by Mercedes-Benz"; one year later the three-pointed star returned officially to the pinnacle of motorsport.

In 1995, Mercedes entered into a partnership with McLaren and won its first race in 1997. One year later, the Mercedes-powered team won the Constructors' Championship and Mika Häkkinen the Drivers' Championship - an achievement he would repeat again in 1999. The partnership with McLaren lasted until 2014 and Mercedes-Benz engines propelled a certain Lewis Hamilton not only to his first Formula One win in 2007, but also to his first world championship in the following year. In his entire Formula One career, Lewis has made every one of his 239 race starts with Mercedes-Benz power. 

2010: A modern-day Mercedes works team in F1 
2019 is the tenth season for Mercedes as a modern-day works team in Formula One. The news of the return of Mercedes to the series spread quickly in 2009, an effect that was further amplified when the team announced its inaugural driver line-up: Nico Rosberg would drive alongside returning 7-time F1 World Champion Michael Schumacher. From the very beginning, the team could also count on the support of its title partner PETRONAS, together Mercedes and PETRONAS have competed in 187 Grands Prix to this day. 

The return to Formula One was not always easy and the team faced tremendous challenges along the way. Mercedes competed for more than two seasons before the team took its first win at the 2012 Chinese Grand Prix - the first Mercedes victory in Formula One since Juan Manuel Fangio's win in the 1955 Italian Grand Prix. After that, it took another year until the team would win again. 
 

The Mercedes-Benz W 25 - "the first Silver Arrow" - at the 1934 Eifelrennen
PHOTO CREDIT: Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport.

Both Lewis Hamilton and Toto Wolff joined the team for the 2013 season; a year in which the team showed some of its performance capabilities as Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport came second in the Constructors' Championship. Since 2014, the team has won five consecutive Drivers' and Constructors' Championships, equalling Ferrari's record for most consecutive double championships from the early 2000s. The Mercedes-Benz Großer Preis von Deutschland will mark another milestone in the motorsport history of the three-pointed start: the 200th race start for Mercedes-Benz in Formula One. 

The foundation of motorsport: the invention of the automobile 
One crucial ingredient of motorsport is, quite obviously, motorised vehicles. So one fairly important event had to precede the first ever car race - and every subsequent motorsport event since: the invention of the car. 

On 29 January 1886, a 42-year-old engineer named Carl Benz filed patent no. DRP 37435 with the Imperial Patent Office in Berlin, Germany, for a "gas-powered vehicle". This date would later become known as the day the car was born - after a number of challenges along the way. For his idea of a "horseless carriage" to work, Carl Benz had to create an engine that was both small enough to fit into a vehicle and strong enough to propel it. Ultimately, his four-stroke engine ran at 400 revolutions per minute - more than twice as fast as other engines at that time - and delivered enough power to drive a vehicle. But Carl Benz did not just develop an engine, he designed the entire car. His "Patent Motor Car" was a three-wheel vehicle that integrated the engine as a central element with a horizontal cylinder and a large, horizontal flywheel. It was the world's first automobile and it was invented in Mannheim, Germany, a mere half hour drive from the Hockenheim circuit. 

Less than 100 kilometres away from Carl Benz's workshop, Gottlieb Daimler and his congenial employee Wilhelm Maybach simultaneously developed a very similar machine in Cannstatt, Germany (now a part of Stuttgart). Just like Benz, Daimler and Maybach had been trying to build an engine that was small yet powerful enough to propel a vehicle. On 3 April 1885, Daimler registered a "gas or petroleum engine" with a closed, oil- and dust-proof one-cylinder engine which could run at speeds of up to 650 revolutions per minute, producing 1.1 horsepower (0.8 kw). The first experimental vehicle in which Daimler and Maybach installed the engine was a wooden-frame two-wheel vehicle - somewhat similar to what we would call a "motorcycle" today. It was not until 1886 that Daimler ordered a carriage and equipped it with his patented engine and a drawbar steering system. This "Motorised Carriage" was the world's first four-wheeled automobile - developed and built only a few short months after Carl Benz had built the first ever car. 

While the invention of the car is inextricably linked to the achievements of Carl Benz and Gottlieb Daimler, the story of its success in the following decades cannot be told without mentioning Bertha Benz, Carl's wife. In his memoires, Carl wrote the following about his wife: "In marrying, I was joined by an idealist who knew what she wanted in all things, from the insignificant to the weighty." Bertha not only finance Carl's endeavours, she also realised the need for publicity for his invention. In August 1888 she went on the first long-distance automobile journey in history to prove the functionality and reliability of the car. Together with her teenage sons Eugen and Richard, but without the knowledge of her husband, she drove 100 kilometres from Mannheim to Pforzheim where she visited her mother. Upon arrival at her destination, she sent a Telegram to her husband informing him of the successful journey. When she returned five days later, the new had spread like a wildfire and everyone was talking about the "Patent Motor Car". In the following years, the popularity of the car rose steadily, although some critics were still not convinced that motorised vehicles would be a lasting success. Famously, the German Emperor Wilhelm II said in 1905: "I believe in horses. Automobiles are a passing phenomenon." 

Today, the fact that the invention of Carl Benz and Gottlieb Daimler changed the course of history, allowing for individual mobility and convenient long-distance travel, is widely recognised. One of the highest accolades was the admittance of Carl Benz's Patent into the UNESCO "Memory of the World" International Documentary Heritage Register alongside other outstanding documents such as the Magna Carta, the Gutenberg Bible or Johann Sebastian Bach's Mass in B minor. 

FEATURE BY - Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport

Solberg sets new Norges Råeste Bakkeløp record on Farewell Tour.

Petter Solberg victory at the Norges Råeste Bakkeløp Hillclimb
PHOTO CREDIT: Petter Solberg Media

Three-time FIA World Champion Petter Solberg settled a bet made over the breakfast table in Måselv. 

Last year his son Oliver set a new record for the Norges Råeste Bakkeløp, Norway’s most famous Hillclimb. 

Petter said he could beat that time. 

Oliver said he couldn’t.

Guess what? Petter smashed Oliver's record. 

Solberg set the new Hillclimb record in his Volkswagen Motorsport Polo R Supercar (2018 World RX Supercar) completing the 3.75km course in 1m37.99s

After setting a new Hillclimb record, Petter joked: “Oliver needs to wake up earlier each morning if he’s going to win this one back!”

The organizers extended the Hillclimb for 2019, and drivers would race a different course compared to Oliver’s record-breaking run last year, but the organizer allowed Solberg one attempt at the old course before they changed the layout. The Norwegian took that attempt and beat his son’s time by six seconds (albeit in a faster car with more power than the Citroën Xsara WRC Oliver used in 2018).

In addition to the Hillclimb, the Norges Råeste Bakkeløp included a variety of events including gymkhana, a drag race, and autocross. Petter won the gymkhana and autocross but lost out to a 1100bhp drag car in a straight line.

“This is a fantastic event and it’s the sort of thing I began my career competing in. That’s why I wanted to bring back some people who helped me race when I was starting out in the 1990s," said Petter Solberg. "This was a really nice reunion with the mechanics and guys."

“I brought back my Volvo 240. My family and me, we built this car ourselves, completely. I’m still so proud of it – and it’s still one incredible machine. In 1995 I won 19 out of 21 Norwegian rallycross races in that car and it still gave me a real buzz to drive it in the gymkhana event on Wednesday. I didn’t drive that car for 20 years, it’s still on the same tyres it was the last time I drove it and we won!"

The next event on Petter Solberg’s Farewell Tour:
Gymkhana GRiD
Location: Poland
Date: September 7

The World RX battle heads up, as the FIA reveals the entry list for Canada.

PHOTO CREDIT: FIA World RX Media.

The battle is heating up for the 2019 FIA World Rallycross Championship. 

SIX DOWN... FOUR to go!

Twenty-two points separate the top three drivers, while 43 points separate the top two teams. 

There are so many unanswered questions heading into round seven of the championship in Canada:

• Can Andreas Bakkerud claim his first win?
• Can Timmy Hansen overturn the deficit to his younger brother?
• Will Kevin Abbring return?
• Can Guillaume De Ridder finally turn his luck around?

Many of these questions could be answered at the World RX of Canada from 03-04 August 2019.

The FIA has released the 17-car entry list for round seven of the FIA World Rallycross Championship.

In addition to the regular drivers, Finland’s Jani Paasonen will make his fourth start of the season with Team STARD and Rokas Baciuska will continue to race for GCK Academy with a Renault Megane R.S. RX Supercar.

Paasonen raced for Team STARD in Barcelona, Great Britain, and Norway, while Rokas Baciuska missed two rounds of the championship after switching teams in the first half of the season and has produced strong performances in Norway and Sweden. 

It remains unclear if ESmotorsport – Labas GAS test driver Kevin Abbring will return to the wheel of the Skoda Fabia Supercar after making an impressive debut in Norway and Sweden.

2019 World RX of Canada: ENTRY LIST

FIA Post-Race Press Conference: 2019 British GP.

PHOTO CREDIT: FIA.com

DRIVERS
1 – Lewis HAMILTON (Mercedes)
2 – Valtteri BOTTAS (Mercedes)
3 – Charles LECLERC (Ferrari)

TRACK INTERVIEWS
(Conducted by Jenson Button) 

Q: Lewis, congratulations, there must be so much emotion in there?

Lewis HAMILTON: Honestly… I’m a bit out of breath! I cannot tell you how proud I am to be here today in front of my home crowd. I’ve got my whole family here, my team. So many British flags out there; I could see them lap after lap. Every year I’ve been coming and I’ve seen it and noticed it and appreciated it. You would think you would get used to something like that but I’ll tell you, it feels like the first time. And I’m just forever grateful for everyone who has come out and spent their whole weekend here. I really hope that you enjoyed the day and God bless you.

Q: I think everyone did. It was an epic race. One of the best British Grands Prix I’ve seen. Today you also made history – six-time winner of the British Grand Prix. 

LH: Jeez. I couldn’t have done it without these guys. I couldn’t have done it without my team. They’re all around here. And the guys back at the factory. Everyone back of the factory and their wives and their kids who are supportive through the whole year of their time away and how dedicated they are to their jobs, so when I tell people thank you to the team there are nearly 2,000 in my team that make this possible. I’m just a chink in that chain. I value them massively and I’m super proud to be a part of this.

Q: Congratulations Lewis, good job. Valtteri, it’s a tough one right? After such a good start, such a good fight with Lewis – he put a good move on you, but to get him back into Copse was a great move. It looked like you had it under control but you were hurt by the safety car.

Valtteri BOTTAS: Yeah, I don’t really know what to say. Congrats to Lewis, massive support for him over here. I stopped first and I was controlling the pit stop gap, so I was still effectively leading the race until there was a safety car and Lewis got a free stop there and he got me there. I also went to the mediums so it meant I had to stop at the end again, so that was pretty much it. So not really my day, but at least the pace was good and it felt good out there.

Q: Yeah, I think there are still a lot of positives to take from today. To take get that pole position around here at Silverstone, a place that is obviously very special to Lewis. And that fight back for me was great to see. Do you take a lot of positives from here moving on?

VB: For sure there are positives. Yesterday I was the quickest on track and that was good and I think the race pace was good today and we had a good fight. I’ll keep fighting, it’s not over yet, so…

Q: Well done. Charles, congratulations, you were the driver the day and I think everyone agrees you were the driver of the day. That was a fantastic race. It was great to see the battle between Max Verstappen and yourself, and it’s the new generation of Formula One. How was the race for you today? 

Charles LECLERC: It’s probably the race I enjoyed the most in my Formula One career. Great to finish third, but today was a very difficult day. The first two stints we weren’t where we wanted to be. I think on the hards we were very strong. But unfortunately with the safety car we lost a little bit of positions, which was not great for us. But yeah, very happy to finish third and extremely happy for the battle we have had on track.

Q: Yeah, as you said, you went for a different strategy it seemed, starting on the soft tyre. It didn’t really work for in the first stint. But as you said, with the safety car, your fight back and your move on Pierre Gasly was also epic – you must take a lot of positives from today’s race, gaining confidence all the time? 

CL: yeah, definitely. I think the last race was a bit of an eye-opener for me, really showing how far we could go. I think it’s great for Formula One to just fight on the limit that way and really happy that this race has gone like this.

PRESS CONFERENCE

Q: Lewis, many congratulations, sensational pace from you all afternoon, culminating in that fastest lap on the final lap of the race. You were undoubtedly helped by the safety car but you had great pace today.

LH: This is one of the best days I can remember having. I was just thinking downstairs, I remember my first win herein 2008 and the feeling that I had coming out of Brooklands and going down the straight towards, at the time, the start-finish line and seeing the crowd, it felt so reminiscent of that today and just the excitement and happiness and joy that I felt was exactly the same as then. The reason I say that is that I’ve done so many races, you know, you think you would get used to it, or that the feeling would numb down, but it felt just as amazing as the first win that I had. So I’m really, really grateful to all those people that have helped me achieve this today. I’ve got this incredible team, There are almost 2,000 people, I always mention, in our team and we got to see them yesterday at a family fin fair kind of event that they do and they will never truly know just how grateful I am but it’s really amazing to be part of this team and to be breaking down walls and records and pushing the limits and boundaries every weekend. You never know if you are really going to be able to deliver a day like today but me and Valtteri had such a good fight. I got him at Turn 7 and then he was on the inside but when we pulled out of the corner I couldn’t really see where he was, he was in my blind spot. He wasn’t in my mirror but I couldn’t see him next to me either, so I couldn’t close the door, just in case he was there and he happens to be there obviously. He drove sensationally well there. So I was, ‘OK, I’ve got to back off, wait until he stops and then nail it after that’. I was going to do a few more laps and hopefully do like an undercut and catch him up etc but the safety car came out and it was perfect timing.

Q: Congratulations. Valtteri, tough day for you, second at Silverstone for you for the thirds time now. The safety car came out at just the wrong time. Was the plan always to make two stops?

VB: Yeah, it was maybe not my luckiest day, but that’s life. Obviously Lewis drove well, he’s got massive support here, so congrats for the win. But obviously we had good racing at the beginning and I really enjoyed it, that’s why we are here, to race hard and fair. I’m sure Toto didn’t maybe enjoy it as much as we did but it doesn’t matter. After my first stop I felt like it was under control. I was following the gap closely, the pit stop gap I had to Lewis, and I was just waiting for him to stop and obviously the safety car got him ahead of me at that point. I was stuck into a two-stop at that stage, because we stopped for the medium again from medium tyres so it meant anyways I had to stop in the end, which was a mistake from our side. Two stop we thought would be by far the fastest but actually one stop was possible as well. Not quite ideal but one of these days… At least it felt like the pace was good today and yesterday so there are positives to take. Also, really, really happy for us as a team, getting maximum points and it’s pretty impressive the gap to the teams behind now. So it makes me very, very proud of us. In any case, I’m still super-hungry for the win so looking forward to doing it again in two weeks.

Q: Well done Valtteri, thanks. A great dice between you and Lewis. And another many who was involved in great dices today was Charles. That battle between you and Max in particular, reminiscent of your karting days. Was it clean, were you happy with the way you fought?

CL: Very happy. That was definitely the most fun I’ve ever had in my Formula One career. Well, it’s a short career, only one year and a half, but it was definitely very, very fun from inside the car. I think that Austria was quite an eye-opener for me to understand how far we could go and what was accepted and I’m very happy at the end to race like this. I think every driver wants to race hard and that’s what we did during most of the race. It was very, very fun, always borderline, but I think always in the rules and very, very enjoyable from the car.

QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

Q: (Phil Duncan – PA) Congratulations, Lewis, on your victory. I know you aren’t one for records but obviously this quite a big one – you’ve won the British Grand Prix six times, more than any other driver in the history of the sport. It’s your home race, a race that’s been on the calendar for 70 years and now you hold that record. How special and amazing does that feel for you? 

LH: Yeah, it feels incredible. I’ve not ever been one to look at statistics. I really take it one race at a time and I like the approach with that. I came here this weekend and I heard people talking about the amount of qualifying poles I’ve had here but I don’t really take any notice of it, I’m just trying to do the best I can and seeing if I can achieve it, but it’s great to be able to have the opportunity to shoot for it. Unless I stop and think about how many wins I have, I didn’t know if it was four or five or whatever it was here. To then hear that I have six and to be up there with the greats. I remember growing up watching this sport and watching a lot of the greats and meeting a lot of the greats and even working with one of the greats and to be up there with them is one of the coolest things.

Q: (Giles Richards – The Guardian) Lewis, yesterday you faced questions about the nature of your Britishness and today after the win you immediately picked up the Union flag and took it one the podium. You’re obviously very proud. Did it mean much more to you to do that at this race? 

LH: To win here at this race?

Q: To wave the flag at this race.

LH: Yeah, this is the greatest single moment of any athlete in the world – to raise their flag as the number one or with the gold or whatever it may be in their home country. It’s one of the single most incredible feelings and special moments an athlete can have. I come here and I’ve got this incredible support. They always talk about how much does it lift you up and it’s a huge amount of energy but a lot of weight comes with that, a lot of responsibility. People save up so much money to come to this grand prix. Everybody is buying merchandise and flags and you just want to deliver for them so much. Not only for yourself and your own ability, you know you can do it, but for your team. I’ve got like 40 family members here – from my mum’s side, from my dad’s side, a bunch of them from the Caribbean. So I just really, really wanted to deliver. And when you achieve something like today and you see all those British flags, I was looking the whole time for a flag, ‘someone give me a flag’, because one day I’m going to be able to look back and I’ll have that picture of me in the car with that flag and I’ll always be able to smile until my dying day.

Q: (Frederic Ferret – L’Equipe) Charles, how difficult was it to defend against Max, and what is your favourite move during that ten-lap battle?

CL: Very difficult. I think we have got some work to do on our race pace and try to keep these tyres as good as Mercedes and Red Bull are doing. I think we are a little bit… struggling on that. The best move was probably the one on Max on the outside in Copse? I think he just passed me and I passed him back around the outside of Copse. That was definitely one of the most exciting of the race. Of my race.

Q: (Luis Vasconcelos – Formula Press) For Lewis and Valtteri. Was it always planned that you’d go on split strategies, or that the second car would go to a different strategy. And if it wasn’t, what was your reaction when you realised that was happening. 

LH: We have the meetings in the morning and they do thousands of simulations of the different strategies. So we’re shown a handful of them: maybe ten different strategies that could happen if we lose position; if we hold position; if we switch positions; all these different things. There was… it’s very difficult for a team – because we are a team – but then individually we want to win. So the team has to do the best and most balance approach for both of us. Most of the simulations come out with ultimately the first car… if you do a good enough job in qualifying, the first car generally gets priority etcetera and it gets quite hard to overtop that, unless you do it on track, or undercut and those kind of things. We had discussed the opportunity of… I think the fastest way to the end of the race was Medium-Medium-Hard, I believe – but there were alternative strategies. That was something I looked into, and I had already decided at the beginning of the race that I was going to take the medium (sic), in the middle stint and extend my first stint to 20 or 21 – whatever it was. Did I know that we were going to stay on the one-stop? No. But, we have to be strategists, almost, a little bit inside ourselves, and it something we’re constantly working on, trying to finesse, because it’s always different. There’s always new figures that have to be put in, from each race, and no-one ever gets it perfect – but the cool thing is that it enabled us to race today. What they probably didn’t expect is that we were going to push so much at the beginning. I think we were expected to save our tyres and stuff – but we were racing pretty hard – which is how racing should be, y’know? So, I’m happy we were able to do that today?

Valtteri, your thoughts on strategy?
VB: Yes, so definitely there was an idea to split the cars. One of us going for the Hard for the second stint but still the idea was for that car to do Medium-Hard-Medium or Medium-Hard-Soft. So one stop honestly was out of the question today, and was a mistake from our side. It was by far the quickest strategy today for our car – the Medium-Hard – we thought it would be much slower so, for sure, a learning point for us.

Q: (Ben Hunt – The Sun) Maybe F1 isn’t broke after all. We’ve had two good tracks, two good races. Is it the case that we need to tweak these Mickey Mouse tracks a little bit and just get some more excitement back in?

CL: Yeah! Silverstone and Austria, I think, are two good tracks I think to overtake on and I think it’s good for the show. The battle was quite good from third place onwards but the Mercedes are still very, very quick. So, if we can all close the gaps to them, will be even more exciting – but definitely the track has an important role in overtaking and the last two tracks are good examples. So, if we can have more of them on the calendar I think it would be a good thing for F1.

LH: Probably in the history of the sport, the drivers have never been a part of the decision-making in terms of advising on tracks. We know better than anybody which track we can overtake and which track we can’t. I don’t know who does the selection, and I know it’s not that they always have a ton of tracks in every country that are possible to race a grand prix – but there are ones that they’re selecting for the future that we’re going to have not such great racing, the ones that are on the calendar that aren’t great. People always ask me which are my favourite tracks and this is one of them because you can follow. It’s just spectacular with the high speed. Austin, Texas is built like that, as a new circuit. But then we’ve got places where you just can’t follow and its like a train. And so, what would you prefer? Having a race in those countries just for the sake of having a race – or do you want a great race like this? If so, then we need to look at the different options in the different countries. I think the really cool track they used to have in Hockenheim – and it still is awesome – but the big, long one they used to have as quite unique. There was always good racing there but they changed it. Austria was great but I think the old track was even better from what I was told by Niki. So, that’s something, hopefully the GPDA can be part of in this next step in 2021 rules. We can be a part of advising on that. We’re there to help make the sport better. If they’re open to… we’re happy having the grands prix in these different countries but if they’re open to the idea of changing or adapting some of the circuits or using a different circuit in the countries, then we should look into that.
Valtteri?

VB: I agree completely. You know definitely it’s all about selection of the tracks. I’m sure many of the track selections for the calendar, it’s just pure political reasons and money, rather than actually focusing on whether it’s good for racing or not. From our side, it’s not that nice. We love racing. Everyone loves good racing, so that’s how it should be. And, like Lewis said, as a GPDA, we’re very keen to give our input because we’re in the car. We know exactly which type of tracks we need to have good racing. We have the feeling. So we are very, very happy to help. And obviously, big plans with new cars, everything for 2021, so hopefully it is going into a better direction, so fingers crossed.

Q: (Christian Menath – motorsport-magazin.com) First of all, congratulations Lewis, question for you. You could have had a free pit stop in the end to go on the softer tyres as well. You knew Valtteri was going for the fastest lap on the soft tyre at the end. Why didn’t you choose the extra stop. Were you so confident you have the extra pace in the old hard tyres in the end?

LH: No, it was really… why take the risk? In my opinion. Yes, I had a pit stop window – but there’s the entry of the pit lane, there’s the stop, there’s the extra pressure on the mechanics to do the pit stop – and it’s not that I doubt them all but you just give chance to it. I’d saved enough in the tyres. I felt good with… the Hard tyre was really great, it could keep going. So it’s obviously a very, very solid tyre. I did have some blistering, so I was kind of conflicted. I was like ‘should I stop?’ I think it would have brought us back closer. I was just like, ‘there’s seven laps left.’ It’s very, very hard to catch a 21-second delta at the pace I can still do. So I decided to… it’s rare that I go up against the team but I decided today that that was the best thing for me. I don’t think… we thought that a two-stop was the best thing and it just worked out today that I was able to save the tyres, meant that we could do a one. My long run on Friday was one of the best long runs that I’ve done, and everyone else was running out of tyres except for me. So, tried to utilise that today and it worked.

Q: (Luke Smith – crash.net) Lewis, you spoke about the battle with Valtteri, could you just talk about the importance of the trust you’ve built up with your team-mate and being able to enter that wheel-to-wheel battle knowing it’s going to be a hard but clean and fun battle?

LH: Yeah, honestly I think… look it’s no secret that Valtteri wants to beat me and I want to beat him and that fighting spirit is stronger than anything, individually for all of us. I think it’s so vital though, to have a respect. I know how hard is it to get a pole here. He did a fantastic job yesterday I know how hard it is to wake up and deliver every weekend, as do these other drivers, so the respect is there between us. I think we want to race wheel-to-wheel and tough. When you’re racing with a team-mate it’s on a different level. If I were racing a Ferrari, you take more risks. Still respectful, but you can lean on them a bit more but as team-mates, we sit down at the beginning of the race, we talk about Turn One and how we’re going to respect each other, make sure we don’t collide, and even when I overtook him and he was coming back, I could have swept across the front and blocked him  – but that’s not the right thing to do. Ultimately it enabled him to get back past – but that’s racing. It was really fair, and it was great. Honestly I was hoping… I was looking forward to maybe some racing later. I was extending that first stint hoping that I’d come out… he was doing some good times so the gap was growing, in terms of me coming out maybe one second, one-and-a-half seconds to two seconds , and I was trying to keep it as little as possible before I finally stopped so that, so that when I came out, I had the advantage on a new tyre and could finally catch him up and try to get past – but the Safety Car came out and kind of intervened. But that was awesome.

Valtteri, anything you’d like to add about your trust, your battle with Lewis. 
VB: I think that’s what we’ve both said, that’s how it is and yeah, it’s all good fun.

Q: (Keith Collantine – Racefans.net) Lewis, following your comments a while ago about wanting to reduce the weight of Formula One cars, FIA president Jean Todt has suggested that one way of doing this would be re-introduce refuelling in the races and some other suggestions he’s made for increasing the unpredictability of races including getting rid of what he calls driver aids, such as your anti-stall devices, reducing the amount of telemetry on the cars and getting rid of the virtual garages that teams use to conference back with the team back at base. What do you think about any of those suggested changes, and also Valtteri and Charles, if you have any thoughts on those? 

LH: Don’t necessarily think that’s going to make a big difference to racing. Do you think it will? I don’t think many of those are going to do much different except for having a lighter car. They’re constantly making these cars heavier and heavier and heavier every year and we’re going faster and we have more downforce and the tyres… it’s really hard for Pirelli to develop a tyre with such limited testing that can sustain that weight etc etc and then the thermal deg, all these different things, it’s like a domino effect so with lighter car, we could fight harder. If you look at the end of the race, the tyres that we have at the end of the race, we can push more, we can race more at the end with so much of a drop-off like today and that’s because the car was lighter on the lighter fuel, so that might not be such a bad thing for us in the future but there’s a bunch of other elements that are not in that list… I don’t know, off the top of my head but as the GPDA we mentioned it.

VB: As long as the cars are lighter it’s always going to be better for everything, for racing, tyres, everything so whatever can be done for the weight is always going to be a bonus and we’re going to enjoy it more, everyone’s going to enjoy it more.

CL: Well, I don’t know, I’ve never raced with refuelling but it was definitely one cool thing to see, so if it’s back in Formula One why not? I will be happy to try. I think the main problem is still that the cars are probably too heavy so these two things for me are separate things but refuelling can be a good idea. Then, to limit the amount of informations to the box or to stop… did you say stop completely the telemetry from the garage or reduce? Yeah. I think we are quite limited in that the cars are so complex now that we also need to make them run, having the help of the engineers, in the background. Yeah. maybe reducing some information but I think we are limited into that, just by the complexity of the cars now. That’s it.

LH: The cars don’t need to be 730 kilos, they just don’t need to be that heavy. They used to be 600 or something was it, years and years ago. I spoke to my engineers and they said if they change the rules we can make it that weight. We just have to take some things off the car but we can make it lighter. Performance items will come off but they can do it.

Q: (Livio Oricchio -  liviooricchiof1.com) Valtteri, on lap 19, Lewis had only 17.4s advantage over you and now he would stop in 21 laps, so he probably would come back to the track with five/six seconds behind you. Can you make a comment? And Lewis, at the end of the race, you had 21s advantage to Bottas, 33 laps with hard tyres and the last lap you set the fastest lap of the race. Your self-confidence would be in the clouds, right? 

VB: I’m not quite sure it was ever going to be five second gap. I think it was about two seconds before the safety car, the pit stop gap, so I was basically controlling it because I knew Lewis would have a tyre advantage on the second stint, because I stopped earlier, to also cover some cars behind and he was continuing, so at the end of the second stint he was going to great opportunity, so I tried to save the tyres, not to push flat out in the beginning and just to be sure that I’m going to be ahead when he stops. And obviously with the safety car he managed to jump ahead so we missed the fight later on.

LH: None of us had driven… only a few teams had driven he hard tyre this weekend. We only had one hard each but obviously the medium that we started on was quite durable for us. I know other teams struggled more and others less but with this first stint was really really mega between us. There was only 0.9s between or one second between us for most of it and then he pitted… I wasn’t planning to stop on lap 21, I was trying to see how far I could go, I was pushing it as far as I could but I had to try and keep up the pace because he had new tyres and he was doing generally better times but the gap went from 0.7s to a second, to 1.5s. He was out of my window, or in my window, yeah, in my window of pit stop and then it was getting to two seconds so I was getting very close to having to stop anyways but then the safety car came out. It was around two seconds, so if I would come out I would have been two seconds behind and he would five or six lap older tyres. But you could see the  pace he had when we restarted. He had really great pace on that tyre, so it wouldn’t have been easy. The harder tyre is slightly slower than the medium tyre so it would have been a difficult race between us but not an impossible one but the thing is, he would have then had to stop again and I knew I wouldn’t have to stop. I generally had a feeling that I wouldn’t have to stop.

The flying lap at the end? I didn’t know what time I could do to be honest but I looked after the tyres and they felt pretty good, even though I had a bit of a vibration on the right front. You know, we have this fastest lap thing… I can’t say that I love it or anything like that but it’s still fun to push. As you go through the race, you have to turn down your engine to save fuel and all these kind of things so that last lap, everyone’s kind of pushing at one point and I heard of the time that he had one and I thought Jeez, I don’t know if I will be able to get to that and then I pushed for that lap… It was like the qualifying lap that I should have done yesterday generally poorly. It was awesome. There’s no better way to finish a race with just like on the edge of your seat, the car moving and it was definitely the best last lap that I’ve ever had.

Q: (Stephen Camp – Motorsport Monday, Motorsport Week.com) To both Mercedes drivers: Lewis, you set the fastest lap at the end of the race. It now means that you leave here with 39 points so it’s one of the biggest leads you’ve ever had at this point of the season so was that one of the reasons behind that too, put the hurt on Valtteri and make sure that you have a big hand on this championship already. And to Valtteri, how does it feel that Lewis was able to do that on 30-lap old hard tyres and you were still on soft tyres? I’m not sure of the life that you had one them but they must have still had the pace to beat the lap that Lewis had done. 

LH: Ultimately, there’s nothing personal between us, you know. Coming to this weekend, you are trying to apply the pressure and come out on top. I didn’t come to this weekend with the idea that I need to extend or anything like that. I need to work my way towards trying to win, how do I do that, and every weekend it’s slightly different but this has been the strongest year that I’ve – to this point in the first ten races – that I can remember ever having. When we were in Barcelona, when we were driving that car, these guys were doing some really serious laps and we couldn’t do that and we were super nervous and I think if we had left Barcelona without discovering some ultimate changes that we ended up making, we probably wouldn’t be where we are right now but still, the journey’s been great and we’re going to go from strength to strength. We’ve got improvements coming, we’re understanding the car a lot, massive download and the technical direction is just… the advancements that this sport makes and that we make as a team – each team makes – is amazing, so I’m excited to see the upgrades that other teams have and the improvements for example that Ferrari make of their use of tyres, the improvements we make to downforce, all these different things, it’s going to be different.

VB: Yes, so I tried to go for the lap with the soft tyre, obviously had more fuel than Lewis at that point but yeah, surprised by the pace on the hards and that shows Lewis managed the hard tyres very well all through the stint, so the wear was quite low so it was possible. From our numbers the hard tyre actually seemed pretty solid. No feelings, really. It was a quicker lap time and that’s it.

Q: (Simon Abberley – Nevis Radio) Charles, previous races your results have been a lot more consistent in comparison to Seb’s results. Today saw another mistake from Seb with this incident with Verstappen. There’s only three points between you now in the championship. In the coming races, do you think the focus might shift from previous races where you’ve had to give way to him? 

CL: Well, I don’t know. I think the team is always acting for the benefit of the team and that’s the way I felt from the beginning of the season. Sometimes obviously, one driver was advantaged, the other one was advantaged at another race. There have been more situations from the beginning of the year where he had to benefit from something but I think the team is always looking at the benefits of the whole team and that’s how it will work for the rest of the season.

FIA Post-Qualifying Press Conference: 2019 British GP.

PHOTO CREDIT: FIA.com

DRIVERS
1 – Valtteri BOTTAS (Mercedes)
2 – Lewis HAMILTON (Mercedes)
3 – Charles LECLERC (Ferrari)

TRACK INTERVIEWS

(Conducted by David Coulthard)

Q: Valtteri Bottas, pole position here at Silverstone. It’s been a while – Barcelona your last one – but you must be particularly proud of that one?

Valtteri BOTTAS: Yeah, it feels very good. It just reminds you of why you do this, these kinds of feelings, but yeah, it’s been pretty close all weekend, and today, with Lewis and just really, really happy to get a good lap and be on pole.

Q: Put us in the cockpit. You had the provisional pole you would look at the overlay and realise that Lewis had made a mistake at Brooklands and you know you have to dig deep and find something. You didn’t manage to improve on that time but where was your mind on the lap in terms of know how good the previous one was?

VB: Yeah, I knew the first lap was good but it was not perfect. Honestly I should have improved on the second run. I didn’t quite get the lap together, especially in the first part of the lap, but I’m glad it was enough. It’s not easy to get a good lap together, it’s easy to do mistakes and I think everyone was struggling a bit, so happy to be on top.

Q: I’m not sure the crowd are happy with what you’ve done but congratulations? 

VB: Thank you.

Q: Lewis Hamilton, it was close and you worked that hard, but we saw you had that little wobble in the second-last lap in qualifying. Tell us about your actual ultimate lap, it’s a tiny gap between you and Valtteri.

Lewis HAMILTON: Yeah, firstly, congratulations to Valtteri, he did a solid job throughout qualifying. Ultimately not good enough, We had worked hard throughout the session but it just got a little bit away from us. We sacrificed a lap in Q2, which would have helped get a reading of where the car was, but we didn’t end up doing that. At the end I had that mistake on the first lap and the second one just wasn’t that great so fair play to Valtteri he did the job. But it’s a long race tomorrow, we’ve got a great crowd here and hopefully I can do something good for them tomorrow.

Q: The crowd are willing you on. It’s another grand prix, or is it? It’s more than just a grand prix, the British Grand Prix for you?

LH: Yeah, completely. It’s the best grand prix of the year and it’s really because of the energy the3 people bring. These tracks are great layouts and designs and areas of space but without people like this to fill it up and bring energy it’s nothing. That’s why we’ve got the best fans here in England.

Q: Charles, well done, fastest Ferrari driver but that’s ultimately not your goal. We looked through free practice and Ferrari looked like they could challenge Mercedes but in the end it was a tough one for you?

Charles LECLERC: Yeah, well, I think also in Q2, up to Q2 we were quite good but then in Q3 Mercedes turned up a little bit the engine, and they were very, very quick also round the corners, that’s where we need to work, we know it. Third place is the best we could have done today and I’m very happy about it.

Q: I saw you having a close look at the Mercedes car. This is the one time on a weekend when it’s acceptable to be a little bit nosy. Anything standing out there that you like?

CL: No, just looking at the state of the tyres, that’s nothing special.

PRESS CONFERENCE

Q: Valtteri, a tremendous lap by you at the start of Q3. Very tight between you and your team-mate. Just how good was that first lap?

VB: It was good. Obviously good enough for pole. There was not much in it between me and Lewis in the end. But still, going into the second run, there were a couple of place where it was clear there was margin to improve so I wouldn’t say it was a perfect lap, but I doubt anyone got a perfect lap today. It was not easy to get everything right and super-sensitive to tiny mistakes here and there with this new tarmac and also with a bit of wind. But yeah, I’m happy that it was enough and it’s definitely a good feeling.

Q: Valtteri, you now have more poles this season than any other driver. Is that significant to you and have you worked specifically on qualifying this year, something more than previous seasons?

VB: It’s not that I have been specifically been working on it. Obviously you always try to improve your performance both on low- and high-fuel, short and long runs. I think the biggest thing for me to work on is the pure race pace definitely, in some kinds of conditions. I mean, year-by-year you are always learning and you get quicker if you work. The main thing is to turn those poles into wins and that’s the main thing for tomorrow.

Q: Congratulations. Lewis, motorsport is full of ifs, buts and maybes. Had you not made that error at Brooklands on your first lap in Q3 and got a complete lap in might it have been different?

LH: It doesn’t really matter at the end of the day. You can’t go back, you can only go forwards. Valtteri did the job, so congratulations to him. And for us, yeah, it just wasn’t the best of qualifying sessions. But there’s a long race tomorrow so I just have to see how I can convert the position I’m in to progress forward. I think the long run yesterday was good, so I hope we can utilise the tyre advantage we have, in the sense of starting on the mediums, so hopefully we can do a good job with that tomorrow.

Q: Did the track conditions fluctuate a lot during that session?

LH: Not really. It’s a little bit gusty here. That’s why it’s so great here at Silverstone, because it’s spread over such a vast piece of land and sometimes it’s raining on one section of the track and not another and it’s gusty in some places and not so much in other places. It really bodes well for a tough track to finish a lap on.

Q: Charles, like Lewis, you came on the radio and said you had made a mistake on that first run in Q3. Do you feel there was more out there today?

CL: No, I don’t think so. Very, very happy with my lap. I think in the last corner I maybe could have done a little bit better, but not much. Overall, I think we are very happy with the performance, very close to Mercedes and we did not expect it. We thought we would be struggling more this weekend. We have been struggling since FP1 with the front end of the car, still in qualifying, but a little bit less. So yeah, it’s a good qualifying session for us. Of course, I would have hoped for a higher position, but third is the best we could have done today.

Q: As with Austria you will start the race on the soft tyre, the guys next to you are going to be on the medium tyre. How do you see the tyre war playing out .

CL: Again, it was thought. So we wanted to do that. Again, in Austria it wasn’t a bad choice. That’s not what made us finish second there so we are pretty happy here too.

QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

Q: (Christian Menath – motorsport-magazin.com) Charles, just following up on the Q2 and the soft tyre. You made the first run on the medium tyre and then set the fastest lap on the soft. Was it always the plan to qualify with the soft, because yesterday’s long runs didn’t look that great and it was a bit surprising to us that you improved your time?

CL: Yes, it was planned like this. The race run was not great yesterday but it was not due to the tyre, as I said. We had some issues with the front end and I think it got better today, so we will see tomorrow whether we have a significant improvement on the long runs, but it was not due to the tyre.

Q: (Scott Mitchell – Autosport) Valtteri and Lewis: Lewis, after practice yesterday you talked about having a little bit of difficulty with the balance of the car, the rear was stepping out a bit. Did that carry into today or were you happy with the car. Valtteri, you started strongly yesterday, has that just continued and do you just feel very happy with the balance of the car?

VB: Well, yeah, from the very beginning, since the first practice the feeling was quite nice. There was definitely room for improvement, especially with the rear end of the car, mainly on the entry of the corners. I think we managed to get it a bit better. It was still the weakness in a couple of places the rear end of the car but it’s not been a massive drama. I managed to build up from yesterday, except for practice three, I was a bit off the pace. I just tried to reset and remind myself of everything I was capable of doing yesterday and it turned out to be good.

Q: And Lewis?

LH: Yeah the car was good. We made a big step forward, so no problems.

Q: (Simon Amberley – Nevis Radio) To Charles: it was mentioned yesterday that maybe the Ferrari race pace wasn’t quite as strong as Mercedes, but with the gaps today and the difference on the tyres do you think possibly if you get a jump at the start, of getting Valtteri and Lewis, do you think you can maybe dictate the pace a bit more?

CL: That’s definitely the target  - to try to use our tyre advantage, especially at the start, to gain positions and then try to keep them. Keeping them will be very difficult because they are extremely quick in race runs but that’s the target.

Q: (Livio Oricchio – liviooricchiof1.com) Lewis, from the outside it didn’t appear that you had the car in your hands all the time. Is it because of the circumstances or maybe you have a set-up thinking more of the race?

LH: No, the set-up suited race trim best and I think yesterday I really did struggle with it on a single lap and of course I was trying to improve it over the evening and into today. It felt great into P3 and it felt really good at the star5 of the Q sessions and it kind of deteriorated through the session, so it got harder and harder, back towards a similar problem we had yesterday – as you saw in Turn 6 for example. But it was also windy. The race trim is still good. I didn’t want to move from the set-up I had, too far away, because it worked so well on the long run yesterday. Fingers crossed the strength in the race should be quite good but again it depends on what position we are in and how the wind is and a bunch of other factors.

Q: (Yassmin Abdel-Magied – The Guardian) I’ve got a slightly less technical question. Lewis, this is your home race and there’s lot of British flags out there and you’ve talked about loving coming back to the UK but there’s contention because you live in Monaco, and your accent isn’t maybe as British as others because you spend a lot of time in the US. So, why do you think that people question your Britishness.

LH: I don’t really know. I don’t really have a good answer for that.

VB: We all live in Monaco!

LH: We all do live in Monaco. It’s crazy now because every driver… I remember growing up, you remember watching Jenson Button and all the youngsters come through, and every one migrated to Monaco and no-one ever said anything about it at the time. Of course, when I did, they had something to say about it. But no matter how often you go abroad or elsewhere in the world, you come back to the UK and you see the beautiful countryside, you see this great… y’know, the history of Formula One and motorsport which is really here, and I see all my family who are also here and this is, of course, feels like where my heart is and ultimately fully British. Of course, I still like to honour my family heritage. My family are from the Caribbean. But… I don’t know. People have a right to their own opinion. If you look around, there’s a lot of Team LH caps. The support that I’ve had has been just incredible and it’s been growing over the years, and whilst, of course, there’s always going to be people with negative views on things, I feel like every day is an opportunity to try to turn those that do have a negative view on things. I guess over time I’ll do more and more positive things for the country. Ultimately, I go to all these race and I lift the British flag proudly. There’s no-one else in this sport that’s raised it so high. At the moment, probably that’s not enough. I’ll keep looking out for what else I can do. And for those who do follow me, I really do appreciate their support.

Q: (Mike Doodson – Honorary) Lewis, there’s been some dramas here at Silverstone with the surface and they seem to have got everything done pretty quickly, but there were quite a lot of incidents at Turn Six yesterday. I wonder if you could tell us – you had one too, I think, there – can you tell us what was wrong there and is it better today and is the circuit settling down?

LH: Ultimately last year, we’d come out of Turn Four and it was the bumpiest straight that probably you’ve ever been on before, rattling your teeth out for most of us. Also, for the motorbikes, it was quite bumpy then. In other areas it was OK. I think they’ve redone it this year; it’s much better on that straight but there are – and I guess it’s just the way it goes – but bumps into Turn Six are pretty hardcore but I think more so it’s the crosswind people are struggling with there. Maybe the bumps and also the crosswind that you have there, which everyone struggles with, and I’ve also struggled with – but then there’s also Turn Seven, it’s very bumpy but then the straight down to Copse is good, and then up to Maggotts and Becketts it’s good. It’s fantastic, and then after Maggotts and Becketts, down Stowe Straight it’s great, 15, 16, 17. So, it’s pretty much spot-on, perfect, apart from three bumps at the entry of Six and exit of Seven.

Q: (Frederic Ferret – L’Equipe) Question to all three drivers. What kind of weather do you expect tomorrow and what is the weather that will suit more the strategy you chose for the first tyre you will start on.

CL: I haven’t watched the forecast yet, so I don’t really know – but I guess, yeah, in Silverstone it’s often very unpredictable, and as we’ve seen in the last two days, you can have drops any time. So, it will make the race quite interesting if it’s like this. Then, if I can choose, the best would probably have a good start on the Soft, do seven laps and then big rain and keep this position. But I don’t choose. I think it will be very unpredictable anyway.

VB: Like yesterday there was no proper chance of rain but it still had a bit of drizzle, so I think anything can come from the sky, you never know – and no idea what will be best for us. At least it’s cooler than Austria, so that’s always good news but anything else, we should be OK.

LH: I’m down for some good old English weather tomorrow! Good old English weather is sunny, hale, rain! Sun, snow, the whole mixture. No, naturally it’s better for all the fans when it’s dry but I don’t mind if it rains either way. It’s really great, this track, in the wet. I guess we’ll all discuss whether we do the rain dance tonight or not.

Q: (Rob Harris – AP) Hi Lewis, it came down to six milliseconds today. Some quotes around from Nico Rosberg saying that, if he’d been travelling and partying in LA, then he’d be qualifying down in tenth – but you can cope with it, he was suggesting. When you assess things, do you think the clearing of the mind outweighs the travel by… sort of… going to LA between races like that and having the trips?

LH: I think naturally it’s easy to say that. People to have views. I do have five world titles. They didn’t come on their own. You know me.

VB: I think you gain time by partying. As a Finn, it’s a feeling.

LH: Valtteri parties way more than me!

VB: I have a party, I gain lap time, so…

LH: I think ultimately, when I started doing the travels and focussing on these other things, people always had… there was always the issue and people would have comments on it. Particularly the pressure of then having to arrive and making sure you definitely delivered the same. It took a long time to break that mould, and I’ve done it time and time and time again. My preparation comes first. I’ve felt fantastic all weekend. The pressure’s quite high here, obviously being your home grand prix, and so I don’t look upon that lightly, and I prepare the best way I can. But also, I do what I want – I don’t do what you think I should do, or anyone else thinks I should do. Only I know what’s right for me – and again, that’s what’s led me to five world titles. And don’t forget the amount of wins I have, all of that stuff, so… yeah.

Q: (Keith Collantine – racefans.net) Question for Charles, you’ve said a few times in recent races you feel you’ve raised your game in qualifying recently. The clearest way we can see that is you’ve just out-qualified Sebastian for the third race in a row – but how much more do you think there is that you can find in the Ferrari? And particularly today, was there the extra eight hundredths of a second that you needed to be sitting where Valtteri is sitting?

CL: At the time, as I said earlier, I think out main issue is the front end. Once we’ll fix this, I’m pretty sure there will be quite a bit of performance in that – because also again, in qualifying today, especially the third sector, I was struggling quite a lot with the front end to grip-up. So yeah, there’s still a lot of performance into that, whether we’ll know how to overcome this issue is another matter, so we need to be working very hard on that, and hopefully some performance will come when we fix this.

Q: (Tom Jackson – City Press) Charles, both Red Bulls split you and Sebastian today. Do you think tomorrow you will be able to comfortably stay ahead of them or do you expect a fight with them more than you do with the Mercedes?

CL: If we look at the Friday race simulations, I think it’s going to be very difficult to fight with  - or at least Lewis’s race run was very very strong so yeah, we need to work on that but Red Bull seems to be very quick also in the race runs so it’s going to be tricky. If we manage to gain some positions at the start, it’s a track where it’s quite hard to overtake so then we have some chances to keep them but if not I guess it’s going to be very difficult to fight with them.

Q: (Laurence Edmonson – ESPN) Valtteri, two of your pole positions earlier this year didn’t quite go to plan, the starts didn’t work out. Can you just explain if you’ve anything to try and rectify that and how the other starts have been and whether you’ve found a solution to it?

VB: Yeah, I’ve definitely been working a lot on the starts this year and especially after the couple of not ideal ones, so I’ve been focusing a lot and feel much more comfortable  with the starts than earlier in the year. Obviously every start is going to be different, we always have different circumstances, different set of tyres, temperatures but yeah, feel more confident and obviously aiming for a good start tomorrow and use the good grid position.

Q: (Sam Hall – Autoweek) Lewis, this year it seems that you’ve found qualifying a little bit harder to get pole on the Saturdays. Is the car a bit more difficult to get the one lap pace out of or is it something that’s changed with you as a driver?

LH: No, I think… we’re not halfway through the year yet. We’ve definitely had some poles but Valtteri has done some great laps throughout qualifying. It definitely has been a car that’s a little bit… I think with the tyres it’s a little bit harder to get it perfect every single time but it’s just qualifying, if you’ve seen a lot of the races, it doesn’t necessarily always determine what happens always in the race. Of course it’s great to always start at the front. It makes your day a little bit more simple but nonetheless it’s really great that we continue to work forwards as a team and lock out the front row. I’m really proud to be a part of that and still to get a one-two today is still significant, considering we have all of our team actually coming this weekend. Of course, Valtteri and I, I think we have a great relationship, we always want to beat each other but I’ll go back, look at the data today, did a better job and tomorrow you’ll do a great job as well and the duel tomorrow is who can do a better job tomorrow. There’s plenty more pole positions up for grabs between all of us so just got to keep working hard.

Q: (Ben Hunt – The Sun) Valtteri and Lewis; Valtteri, when we spoke you said the time is now for you to start effectively getting your elbows out. Indeed, is this the time that you’re starting to sense that? Lewis, are you prepared to race against what I guess we could call Valtteri 2.1, new version, newly enthused, ready to go again after a good start and obviously a bit of a slump but coming back?

VB: Well, if you look at the points, for sure the championship fight is still on. Obviously I’m the one chasing, I’m behind with I don’t know the exact number but roughly thirty points or something but so many races to go and it’s going to be a lot up to me and my performance, so definitely every single opportunity there is I need to get those and if I don’t get those then Lewis is going to be far away and not be able to reach in terms of points so tomorrow is super important, but so is the race after and the race after. The season is still long so I really need to try and take those opportunities and for sure will do everything I can to keep that lead tomorrow.

Q: Lewis, your thoughts on Valtteri 2.1?

LH: 2.1 or 2.4 or what’s the difference? I work closely with this guy, it’s Valtteri. I just see him as the man he is. Obviously we’re still fighting for the title. I don’t feel necessarily that he’s the only one chasing, I’m still chasing. I try to put an imaginary individual ahead of yourself. For me, I generally kind of put the previous year’s performances so last year’s myself ahead of me, for example and that’s my target: to improve and beat that, but on days like this I’m behind another so he’s now the guy that I’m chasing. So as long as you’ve always got a goal to chase, then you can always make improvements, you always have strides to make and so that’s my approach always.

Q: (Simon Amberley – Nevis Radio) The past couple of races we’ve had incidents that have been reviewed after the race which have either potentially affected the result or have affected the result. Has this been discussed within the drivers’ meetings and can we expect results to actually stand at the end of the race and drivers to be able to race more aggressively in future races including here?

LH: I was focusing on folding… I don’t know what the question was.

CL: I’m always up for hard racing so very happy if they relax a little bit on the fights but I think consistency is key. At the end, I think they also need time to review some incidents or sometimes it be bad to wait for the results but at the end I think it’s the best way to take the right decision.

VB: Yeah, I’m a big fan of hard racing as well so the harder we can race, but safe and fair, is always good and obviously for everyone it’s always better to have the results as quickly as possible and penalties as quickly as possible but sometimes they need to review more which is understandable.

LH: I feel exactly the same as these two guys. I still don’t know what the question was really! But close racing is always yeah, what he just said. Sorry. It wasn’t intentional to miss what the question was. About tough racing, was it? I haven’t discussed it. No. I don’t think it was brought up in the drivers’ briefing either. I think the last race was good. I don’t know what Charles thought of the incident he had.

CL: No, I thought it was OK. The only thing is consistency as I said. I feel like there have been some incidents in the past this year that have been not analysed or penalised, sorry, for much less than that, so that’s the only thing. I think consistency is very important but if it’s clear that we can race that way then I’m more than happy to race like this and I think every driver likes to race that way.

LH: I agree again! I think it’s really hard with the consistency thing because we’ve got these rules that… but every scenario is different but you have to apply the same rule to it so it’s… that’s why they’ve got some of the guys that are at the stewards, some even have to interpret certain a way what has happened at certain way and as Charles said, consistency is really what we want to try and get. But I think every year you go through all the lessons or they, together in the sport, go through the lessons and learn and improve and people told us that it needs to get better and so I’m sure we will.