Post-GP Stats Analysis: Britain

Hamilton's dominant win

Lewis Hamilton won his seventh race in Silverstone, the first for him starting from the second row of the grid.

Hamilton won by a margin of 1:08.577 over Nick Heidfeld, and this is the largest margin since Damon Hill led a depleted field by two laps in the 1995 Australian Grand Prix. In that race several front-runners retired due to collisions or mechanical failures, and Hill won ahead of Olivier Panis.

To find another race where the two leading drivers were on the same lap and the gap was bigger, we have to move back another year, at the 1994 Pacific Grand Prix, where Michael Schumacher won by 1:15.300 over Gerhard Berger.

Honda and Barrichello back on the podium

Honda scored with Rubens Barrichello their ninth podium in history, the fourth since their return to racing in 2006. The last time Honda were on the podium was in the 2006 Brazilian Grand Prix with Jenson Button, and last time Barrichello climbed on the podium before this year's British Grand Prix was in the 2005 US Grand Prix when he took second behind then-teammate Schumacher in a Ferrari.

Barrichello scored his 62nd podium and thus ties with David Coulthard at the fourth all-time spot behind Schumacher (154), Alain Prost (106) and Ayrton Senna (80).

The Honda driver conquered this podium 14 years 2 months and 19 days after his maiden podium in the 1994 Pacific Grand Prix, making it the third longest time-span between podiums in Formula One history. At the top stands Riccardo Patrese with 15 years, 1 month and 29 days (Sweden 1978 - Hungary 1993) and at the second Schumacher with 14 years 6 months and 9 days (Mexico 1992 - China 2006).

Joint leads

Following the British GP, there is a three-way tie at the top of the points standing. This also happened last year after Bahrain, when Fernando Alonso, Kimi Raikkonen and Lewis Hamilton had 22 points each.

It's only the third time this happens in 59 seasons: the third time occurred in the first year, 1950, when after Indianapolis Nino Farina, Juan Manuel Fangio and Johnnie Parsons all had 9 points after three races.

Qualifying notes

• First pole for Heikki Kovalainen, the 91st driver in history to start from pole position. It's also the third straight year that a McLaren car started on pole at Silverstone.

• Mark Webber equalled his best career qualifying result, a second place he gained four times: Malaysia 2004, Spain 2005 and Monaco 2006 being the other occurrences.

Webber missed a historical result by losing pole to Kovalainen in the dying moments of qualifying: the last time an Australian driver was on pole position dates back to 1980, when Alan Jones recorded his last pole in Germany.

Nevertheless, it's only the second time that Webber was able to qualify inside the top-10 in Silverstone out of seven attempts - the other one being in 2004 (9th).

• The second place by Webber is the best ever result for Red Bull who, up to Great Britain, counted a fourth place by Christian Klien in Japan 2005 as their best performance.

• Since Robert Kubica wasn't able to complete a flying lap in Q3 he had to record his first defeat against his teammate Nick Heidfeld in qualifying in the 2008 season. At the moment only Fernando Alonso has always beaten his teammate in qualifying this year.

• Nick Heidfeld equalled his best season performance with a fifth, which he already scored in Australia and Malaysia. It's the sixth time in nine races that a BMW Sauber qualifies fifth. This is Heidfeld's best grid position in Silverstone, as previously he didn't mange to do better than 9th (2001, 2006 and last year).

• Renault recorded their first back-to-back races this season with both cars qualified inside the top-10. The last time it happened, it was exactly one year ago in the same races, France and Great Britain.

• Nelsinho Piquet improved his best career performance, going from the ninth place, which he recorded in France, to seventh.

• Sebastian Vettel qualified for the second time this season inside the top-10 after Australia;

• Worst qualifying spot of the season for Felipe Massa, ninth. The Brazilian didn't qualify this low down on the grid since Hungary last year, where he was 14th.

• Worst qualifying spot of the season also for Robert Kubica, who didn't record a double-digit qualifying result since Belgium last year, when he was 14th.

• Best qualifying result for Sebastien Bourdais, 13th.

• Jarno Trulli equalled his worst season result with a 14th place, which he recorded also in Canada.

• Jenson Button recorded his best grid placement in Silverstone in three years, a dismal result as in 2006 he was 19th, in 2007 18th and this year 17th. Jenson was able to qualify inside the top-10 in Silverstone only in his debut year, 2000, when he was 6th, in 2004 (3rd) and 2005 (2nd).

Race notes

• Nick Heidfeld equals for the sixth time his best career result, a second place.

• sixth straight fastest lap for Kimi Raikkonen. And, with a fourth-place finish, the Finn is the seventh driver to score more than 500 points in career. He overtook Alonso in this ranking, now the couple is only one point apart, with Raikkonen at 504 and Fernando at 503.

• Raikkonen was not on the podium at Silverstone for the first time after five years.

• The last time both Ferraris finished the race a lap down (or more) was in the 1996 Brazilian Grand Prix.

• For the first time in his career, Felipe Massa ended the race lapped twice by the leader. It's also the first time he was classified last.

• For the fourth time this season, and the second straight, Jenson Button retired due to a spin or an accident. Jenson is recording his worst season as far as race accidents are concerned: before 2008, his worst score was in 2002, when he retired three times due to accidents or spins.

• For the first time after seven races, a Red Bull car didn't score points.