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 | |  Tuesday, 11 December, 2001, 19:35 GMT Silverstone in deep water  Silverstone hosted the first Formula One race in 1950 BBC motorsport correspondent Jonathan Legard reports on the threat to the British Grand Prix and the long-term implications for the future of Silverstone. It never rains but it pours for the British Grand Prix organisers. Silverstone's woeful mudbath over the 2000 race weekend was bad enough publicity - an official warning over traffic problems and logistical shortcomings at the circuit was fully merited. But this latest dispute with motorsport's global hierarchy over the future of next year's Grand Prix has taken an extraordinary turn. Yes, Formula One's governing body, the FIA, was not satisfied with traffic arrangements for this summer's race and had again requested a report on the matter before confirming the provisional 7 July date in 2002.
But how is it that, in the week before the FIA's World Council meets in Monaco to consider the findings, sources close to the authority - revealed to the BBC by Sir Jackie Stewart as FIA President, Max Mosley - suggest that a decision has already been taken? Namely that the British Grand Prix - the first ever world championship race in 1950 - will lose that championship status next season. Whither the democratic process, as Octagon, the Grand Prix organisers readily point out? It would appear that the 24 members of the World Council are required only for the sake of appearances and a rubber stamp. The plot thickens when you consider that among those pledging to upgrade Silverstone's admittedly shabby environs as part of a �40m three-year masterplan is none other than Bernie Ecclestone, F1's powerbroker.
Surely the time to beat the British with a big stick was in the aftermath of the Easter weekend fiasco in 2000, when so many chickens came home to roost. At the race 12 months later, the public arrived and departed amid improved, if not perfect, traffic planning. Stewart, Octagon and high-ranking members of F1 teams based in Britain angrily highlight congestion at other venues like Belgium and Germany. They argue that Silverstone has become a political football in an arena where fast cars are a sideshow. The implications for Silverstone, if the world council follows the lead of its president, are enormous. Scrubbing the Grand Prix from the championship calendar but still having a race with no points awarded would almost certainly attract very few F1 teams, unless other financial incentives remained on offer. But if, say, Michael Schumacher and Ferrari withdrew, how many spectators would demand refunds or how many more shun one of the British summer's traditional sporting landmarks?
A throwback Race of Champions, unheard of nowadays, has already been dismissed by Silverstone officials. More seriously in the long term, Silverstone's multi-million pound vision for the future would be utterly compromised. I understand that investment in 2002 would be virtually nil and the project would fall ruinously behind schedule, possibly never to recover. If, as has been suggested, the race is transferred to France to the Ecclestone-owned Paul Ricard circuit in the south of the country, who's to say it would ever return? After all, the modern day mantra of Messrs Mosley and Ecclestone is that no country has a divine right to a grand prix. Britain is about to find out the truth behind those words. The irony for those fighting Silverstone's case is that the crucial World Council meeting on 14 December takes place in Monaco. It is treasured as F1's jewel in the crown but regularly considered wholly outgrown as a modern-day Grand Prix venue. | |
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