Silverstone To Have A Full Capacity Crowd

There is some brilliant news for British fans. Silverstone have confirmed the race will go ahead on the weekend of the 16-18th July at the full 140,000 capacity. To attend, spectators must either be fully vaccinated or have proof of a negative COVID test.

Silverstone had the highest attendance numbers of any Grand Prix in the 2019 season. However, the capacity came into questions after the UK government delayed the final stage of the COVID opening plan from the 21st June to the 19th July, the day after the Silverstone race. The event is going ahead as part of the Event Research Programme, acting as a test event.

This will also be the first weekend of the new Sprint Race format. The timings of the weekend are not as usual. The weekend will looks like this:

Friday: Practice 1 14:30-15:30

Qualifying 18:00-19:00

Saturday: Practice 2 12:00-13:00

Sprint Qualifying 16:30-17:00

Sunday: Race 15:00

There will also be F2, WSeries, GP3 and Porche Mobil 1 Supercup racing that weekend in between F1 events.

Here is what President and CEO Stefan Domenicali had to say:

"It is fantastic news that Silverstone will be a full capacity event...It will be an incredible weekend with hundreds of thousands of fans being there to see our first ever Sprint event on Saturday and the main event on Sunday."

Seven-time World Champion Lewis Hamilton was more cautious about the news. In the Thursday press conference, he said:

"I am kind of split... One, I can't tell you how excited I am to see people and the British crowd because it is the best crowd of the whole year. Last year we didn't have them, so to be able to see them and feel the energy that they bring into a weekend.... On the second, obviously I watch the news so I hear about the cases going up massively in the UK. So on that side I worry for people, naturally'.

The other British drivers Lando Norris and George Russell were more optimistic about the news. Norris said:

"It's great, I am delighted... It's really nice to have them back... I look forward to it'" and "It's just nice to have fans back, particularly British fans because they're the best obviously".

Russell commented:

"Mega excited for everyone. Hearing that news is great, knowing that it is going ahead safely as well" and "I have one of my best ever memories from Silverstone, just going there, seeing all the fans cheering, you know, it gave me goosebumps... us as drivers, we need it."

You can see the British drivers' full reaction here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7VMEGv6rfo

Here at In The Pits blog, we are particularly excited. We will be in attendance at Silverstone for all 3 days so stay tuned for some exciting first hand content across the race weekend!