During the coverage of last week’s F1 British Grand Prix at Silverstone there seemed to be a genuine sense of shock and surprise to the announcement that the nearby Donington Park circuit (it’s 85 miles away) had brokered a deal to host the British Grand Prix for 10 years starting in 2010.

This should have come as a surprise to no-one for several reasons.

(1) History
While there seemed to be an undercurrent among commentators that Silverstone was the traditional home of the British GP and should remain so, it doesn’t stand up to examination from a historical perspective.

Yes, the first round of the modern F1 World Championship was held at Silverstone, but since then the British round has also been held at Brands Hatch and Aintree. When I first started attending GPs the feeling was that Brands was the event’s “rightful” home and many people objected to it having alternative dates with the “flat boring airfield circuit in the midlands.” (i.e. Silverstone)

In the years immediately before the second world war and the subsequent post war birth of modern F1, Britain’s de-facto Grand Prix circuit was - Donington Park.

(2) Ambition
Ever since Donington Park was rebuilt and reopened in 1977, and especially after the Melbourne Loop was added in 1985 to extend the track, the owners of the circuit made no secret that their ultimate ambition was to have Grand Prix racing return to Donington. They succeeded in 1993 when the European GP was held at the circuit (and was a classic race still recalled today by anyone who witnessed it).

Since then at various times many of the F1 teams have done development work or testing there. More recently Minardi used Donington to host their “fan appreciation” events running both race cars and the amazing two-seater F1 cars at the track.

The establishment and continued growth of the Donington Grand Prix Collection of classic F1 cars should have also been an obvious signpost of the circuit’s ambitions. Shouldn’t the worlds best collection of F1 race cars be held at a circuit that hosts F1 racing?

(3) Politics
It’s a well established fact that F1 show runner Bernie Ecclestone and the British Racing Drivers Club, who own Silverstone, have never really seen eye-to-eye. Every year Ecclestone rattles the saber about taking the British GP off the calendar unless Silverstone does this-or-that. And every year the GP is “saved.” It only takes a few seconds thought that there is no-way that the British GP would be taken off the calendar under the current series make-up. Most of the teams are based in the UK, that’s where most of the engineering expertise comes from. On the technical level it’s a small industry and its a British centric one. I don’t believe the threat was ever that the British GP was in danger, but that Silverstone’s “right” to hold it was. The obvious alternative, move it to a new location. The mutterings about holding a street race in London were totally impractical - but when you have an alternative in the same general area, that already has an existing infrastructure, experience of holding international events and is willing to make large investments - then it seems an obvious move.

From a personal perspective as someone who has been to major events at both circuits (and even been lucky enough to do a few laps of both of them), I always preferred Donington - so I for one was delighted to hear the announcement last week and look forward to the 2010 British Grand Prix from Donington Park.

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 13th, 2008 at 3:17 pm and is filed under Formula One. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.