Silverstone confident over ticket sales

Silverstone was left in limbo while Donington Park's hopes of staging the race fell apart, and it meant tickets for the event have gone on sale months after they have traditionally been made available.

Although that leaves the track with a tougher than normal task in selling the event, Silverstone's managing director Richard Phillips is bullish that the 2010 race will not suffer as he eyes another sell out.

"It was a shame that we could not have gone on sale earlier, but we had to do the right deal," said Phillips, who has worked hard to help secure a long-term contract for the British GP.

"A 17-year deal is the right time frame and, if we had rushed to get on sale too quickly, it would probably have been the wrong thing to do. But we have got a good team and we have got a great circuit and great fans."

Phillips says the late availability of tickets is not a totally new experience for Silverstone, and that the early indications about fan interest are promising.

"This happened to us five years ago when the last contract started, and I remember going into Christmas with a bit of trepidation," he said. "But when we came out at the end of January we had sold a lot of tickets.

"So I think hopefully there is a latent demand there. The indications are that there are. We went on sale on Monday, so we are hopeful that people will be buying those tickets in numbers."

Phillips has also said that the period of uncertainty caused by Donington Park's troubles were not easy for him to cope with.

"That was a difficult time for us. The whole Donington saga was. When it happened on the Friday of Silverstone in 2008, it was probably one of the worst days of my life to be honest, and it has been very difficult.

"They did fall over, and I wish they had not done it the way they did it. I wish they had a circuit up there that was like the original circuit, because there was no real reason for them to kill the business."