2023 British GP: Post Race Analysis

[SS454]

One of the better old school tracks, but not the most exciting race. Definitely some shake up with updates and perhaps the new tire that Pirelli introduced.

Red Bull take their 11th straight win. The team is operating in top form. The designers, the engineers, the mechanics, the strategists, and of course Max Verstappen. He talked about the race being more difficult than usual and he was never really challenge for the win. Yikes. Checo, perhaps the only member of RBR that isn't performing. Recovery drives because he can't qualify the best car inside the top 10 is not impressive.

McLaren. WOW! The upgrades they brought are even more impressive than the improvements that Aston Martin made over the winter. To transform the car from a back of the grid clunker to the 2nd best car at Silverstone. Immensely impressive. Lando drove a tremendous race. Had a killer start, great composure against Max, and drove the wheels off it with the hard tires on the restart. Oscar was pretty much just as impressive and absolutely deserved the podium. Tough luck with the SC, but still an outstanding drive.

Mercedes once again a bit off in quali but super strong race pace. Hamilton certainly got lucky with the SC, but still drove a great race. His wording during the post race interviews were perhaps not the best. Once again claiming HE knew the problem and suggested the team needs to listen to him to fix it. He probably just means the car needs a better rearend and less drag, but the way he worded it comes off a bit conceded. George Russell had one of the best drives of the race, perhaps could have been on the best strategy. His first stint on softs was the most impressive of anyone. He was in prime shape to fight with the optimal Medium tire at the end. Unfortunately the SC ruined his race.

Aston Martin going backwards. Very sad to watch, but perhaps is not all that surprising. That team is not known for being great at development. Hopefully they can turn it around, but they are at serious risk of dropping to 4th in the WCC. Alonso got lucky and could only finish 7th. It was unlikely to expect Stroll to score points even if he had his best race.

Williams have made some serious improvements on their car, and hopefully they can fight for a point here and there. Despite looking strong all weekend, they are still likely only the 7th best team. Albon got very lucky with when the VSC came out and got a nice pitstop. Drove great to defend against Leclerc and still pressure Alonso, so 8th is a very good result for him. Logan Sargeant had perhaps his best race. 11th. Hopefully that brings him a lot of confidence.

Ferrari, hopefully Silverstone is just a poor track for them. Why they pitted so early while on the best tire to switch to the undesirable hard compound... who knows. It didn't really work out. The reality is the Ferrari was pretty bad on any tire. Both Charles and Carlos were a victim of the SC, but they only had pace to finish maybe 7th and 8th anyways.

Alfa Romeo silently had a decent performance. Unfortunately so many cars have brought good updates that chances for points are going to be very difficult. Even though Bottas had superb performance, only to finish 12th. Zhou wasn't too far behind, though a few more places down.

Haas is another team that needs upgrades badly. Hulkenberg has been brilliant in qualifying, but the car just isn't a good race car. Is this an indication that the Ferrari PU has some sort of modes to be good with Max power, but need to be turned down significantly in the race? Magnussen was having an okay race as well until his Ferrari PU blew up.

AlphaTauri. Did anyone actually see them in the race? I guess they were so slow the TV director didn't bother to show they participated and finished last of the running cars.

Alpine a very tough day. A double DNF killed their championship battle as they are now 12 points behind McLaren. Gasly was driving good, but his cry victim nonsense against Stroll was a bit much. He didn't leave enough room to Stroll when he got passed, and while he did leave room when he got hit, he is lucky that wasn't just ruled a racing incident.

Driver of the Day: Lando Norris. Spectacular start, lead his home grand prix, played the smart game. Toughed it out on the hard tires at the end. Great race for Lando.

[patrese86]

Good summary

[Brembo]

Lets hope next race one of our drivers is "Driver of the day! "