British Grand Prix in 90 seconds

By Mark Hughes BBC F1 commentary box producer

The combination of McLaren team harmony and Lewis Hamilton's virtuosity is creating a force that might not be overcome even by Red Bull's sledgehammer performance.

McLaren lead both the drivers' and constructors' championships with a car that has set only one pole ahead of a team with nine.

With a car that was 0.7 seconds slower than the Red Bull in qualifying at the British Grand Prix, McLaren took only one point less from the race.

Second and fourth place finishes did not look on the radar for McLaren on Friday evening as the new exhaust-blown floor and its accompanying exhausts were removed in favour of the standard arrangement

Even with the standard floor on Saturday the MP4-25 did not look comfortable over Silverstone's bumps.

Hamilton happy with second place

It is a stiffly suspended car, as if it needs to be kept within a very narrow window of ride height and pitch to access its aerodynamic performance. On smooth tracks this is no real problem but the new loop of Silverstone proved unexpectedly bumpy.

With that as the backdrop, Hamilton did a stunning job to qualify the car on the second row - and that starting position was the foundation of his second place in the race.

As well as his superlative car control, the key to Hamilton's qualifying was his ability to get the soft tyre up to temperature for the first flying lap.

Team-mate Jenson Button could not get that temperature until the second lap but the tyres could not maintain their optimum grip to the end of that lap and ended up 14th - knocked out at the end of second qualifying.

"Jenson's Q2 lap was actually slightly faster than Lewis's right up to turn 11," said engineering director Paddy Lowe, "but then the tyres gave out and he had no grip at the end of the lap. Getting the tyres to perform on the first lap was essential."

Button delighted with first-lap charge

The volatile circumstances at Red Bull played their part in a no-compromise fight into the first corner that led to Sebastian Vettel puncturing a tyre, meaning Hamilton had only one faster car ahead of him - that of Mark Webber.

With Robert Kubica's much slower Renault holding the rest of the field at bay - including the potentially McLaren-beating Ferrari of Fernando Alonso - Hamilton's task was made relatively simple. The real work of genius had already been done - the day before.

But the result was about more than only Hamilton's skills. It was also about McLaren's great facilities and the harmonious balance within the team.

ANDREW BENSON'S BLOG In Hamilton, Red Bull face a rival who is absolutely at the top of his game and on Sunday brilliantly salvaged a second place

In a weekend when Red Bull created their own divisions about which driver used a faster wing, McLaren pooled their resources on Friday, listened to each of their drivers about the preferred route forward - Button wanted to revert to the old floor, Hamilton wanted to keep the new one - compared it with the data they were seeing on the simulator with test driver Gary Paffett and ended up supporting Button's view.

The standard floor was fitted to both cars for the rest of the weekend but it created no animosity between the drivers and was subsequently proved to be a good call.

"Even though we ended up not qualifying or racing the blown-floor," said team principal Martin Whitmarsh, "I feel it was good that we ran it on Friday because it means we now go to Hockenheim armed with data and able to make modifications to it based on what we found on Friday."

There is a real prospect, in other words, of McLaren closing the performance gap to Red Bull that opened up at Silverstone - but while still retaining its harmony and balance, not to mention a head start in the championship.

Mark Hughes has been an F1 journalist for more than 10 years. He is the award-winning author of several books.

Highlights - British GP qualifying (UK users only)

E-mail this to a friend

Printable version