What can we infer from the result of the British Grand Prix regarding the likely identity of this year’s Formula 1 World Champion? Not a sausage. Bugger all. A race gifted from one of the two title protagonists to the other, one in which the greatest driver of his era simply threw away his chance of a decent result and one in which the final place on the podium was filled by someone else at his 239th time of asking from 19th on the grid.
No race held so far this season that has seen more violent overturnings of inter-team apple carts – if Hamilton beating Leclerc by a vast margin is a surprise, what about Stroll dusting Alonso? – nor any that has exposed more vividly what the rookies still have to learn: in the year of the newbie driver, just one of them – Ollie Bearman – hung around long enough to see the flag.
So let’s not spend any time trying to reach conclusions that are not there to draw, but first celebrate Lando Norris becoming the 13th British driver to discover what it’s like to win at home, and McLaren’s 15th win in Britain, moving the team to within three of Ferrari’s record total here, despite having been in the sport for 16 fewer seasons. Should Lando have won? On pace I suspect not. I think Oscar Piastri had both that race and his teammate where he wanted them before the safety car came out, and you could see his boiling anger and sense of having been wronged for the 10-second penalty he received for braking too hard while leading the pack. Still, at least it’s nice to see a bit of emotion from the lad. And Lando was there to cash in, just as Oscar would have done had the roles been reversed.
