British Grand Prix on the move
July 4th, 2008
Well the dramatic news of the day is that the British Grand Prix will be moving from Silverstone to Donington in 2010. Personally I’ve never liked Silverstone, beyond the first third of the race the track is boring, the facilities are awful and the circuit lacks character. Brands Hatch remains the true venue for the British Grand Prix.
Donington has previously hosted Grand Prix and most notably was the scene of possibly the greatest first lap in Formula 1 history.
A suitably excitable South American commentator in that Youtube clip.
Some of us on Linksheaven were at Donington recently to cheer on John Edwards and you can see the photos from that event here. Years and years ago I was at Donington to watch what (I believe) was the first truck race in Europe, which was smashing (literally) good fun.
Donington as a track has character. It is undulating and it has a Spitfire on a pedestal overlooking the track. As a circuit it is rather narrow and short so I’m afraid it would lead to quite boring Formula 1 races. The track facilities are not good, but there is lots of room for expansion. Getting in and out of the track is an utter nightmare.
The best part of Donington is the museum, which has probably the finest collection of F1 cars ever assembled. Any museum with a “McLaren hallway” has to be something special
Entry Filed under: Formula 1
2 Comments Add your own
1. Art | July 5th, 2008 at 5:08 am
Thanks for posting that clip Roy.
It’s been a while since I’ve seen it.
Murray’s call:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-t75o84nHE
2. F1 Betting King | July 6th, 2008 at 1:21 pm
Donnington is a far nicer circuit than Silverstone, but it’s gonna need a hell of a lot of work done to it. Gonna need a load more grandstands, far better toilet facilities, not to mention a huge improvement for traffic getting in and out. Hopefully they don’t completely lose the charm of it by covering it in concrete.
As far as i know the plans have not actually recieved full planing permission as of yet, and are unlikly to be made public until they do.
Leave a Comment
Some HTML allowed:
<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>
Subscribe to the comments via RSS Feed