Liam Lawson didn’t see-through Lap 1 in F1 British GP, as Isack Hadjar was caught out by conditions to hit Andrea Kimi Antonelli, while Gabriel Bortoleto got greedy with power.
Already at the start in F1 British GP at Silverstone, the race was over for Visa Cash App RB’s Lawson, who was taken out at the left-hander when three tried to get by. The Kiwi was on the outside with Esteban Ocon in the middle, when Yuki Tsunoda tried to take the inside line.
With nowhere to go, Ocon and Lawson touched which ended the Kiwi’s race. The media told him about Tsunoda being on the inside which made sense to the Visa Cash App RB driver. He thought to use the conditions to their advantage, but it all came undone for on Lap 1 itself.
He took it sportingly, but for his team, it was a disaster after Hadjar crashed out later on. The rain intensified as the grand prix progressed but the race direction went green after brief time behind the safety car. The Frenchman was caught out by low visibility to hit Mercedes’ Antonelli.
The Italian braked a bit earlier as he couldn’t see the braking point either. It damaged his diffuser and he eventually retired after few laps of running. Hadjar retired immediately as he was sent into the barrier. Antonelli didn’t put the blame on the Frenchman and took it as racing incident.
Both felt that the conditions were too poor to race under green flag. Apart from a spin for Max Verstappen, another incident that ended in the barrier was for Sauber’s Bortoleto. He lost it at Turn 1 when he got a bit greedy to go on power and hit a wet patch to spin off.
Here’s what they said –
Liam Lawson: “I haven’t actually seen it yet, so I don’t know what happened. I knew I was next to Esteban through Turn 4 and then I tried to leave a bit of space through Turn 5 and I got hit. So, I don’t know. [Yuki was on the inside of Esteban.] Unfortunately, I can’t see two cars next to me, we came out of Turn 4 and I just saw Esteban, he was next to me through Turn 4, yeah, I need to look at it and see. We were talking about it [changing to slicks] and I nearly went in with the same decision but the last sector was still very wet. Watching the F2 and F3, it was taking quite a while for the track to dry. I think we made the right call, I had a good start, we would have had a very fast car in these conditions, it suits what we were running this weekend.
“So I was just really trying to survive, just do anything aggressive, yeah, that’s it. It is the sport, it is Formula 1, been there many times and I am sure I’ll go through it many more times, but it is part of racing. I sympathise with everyone out there [racing] in these conditions, when you have races like these, we normally love it, it is an opportunity for us to have a very strong race, you look at Brazil last year, it doesn’t matter about the car you are in, you can make something happen. Obviously, at the same time, it is very-very tricky and that’s why these opportunities are there, even with Isack, just couldn’t see Kimi.”
Isack Hadjar: “I am okay. It was quite a complicated race, the pace was very good, I must say, I was following Charles and we were on the same strategy, just like George. We all decided to pit before the end of the formation lap, which didn’t pay off, so were at the back. Once the re-start, there was worst visibility ever and yeah, I lost it. For me, it was no point racing in these conditions because already in the laps to safety car, I couldn’t see much, the tyre temperatures are going down, becoming tricky, so I was actually quite surprised that we didn’t wait for better conditions but in the end, it was quite predictable.”
Andrea Kimi Antonelli: “First of all, I don’t know what to say, just seems like everything is going wrong at the moment and it is hard to find some positives. We took a gamble on Lap 1, unfortunately it didn’t work because as well, as just when we pitted, the VSC came out. We just couldn’t build any temperature into the tyres. When we went back on the inters, obviously the visibility was extremely poor and I don’t why but I could feel it coming. In the moment, I was lucky to still keep it on track because the hit was massive and yeah, just a shame to finish with another zero.
“I think I lost like 100 points of downforce (Wolff confirmed it to be 40), the whole diffuser was gone and it was extremely difficult to keep the car on track. No one to blame really, it was just…that’s why when they told me about re-start, I was unsure about that because the visibility was still very poor at lower speed. So, at higher speed, it would have been even worse. I was just a passenger, I broke a bit earlier because it was so hard to see where the corner was and Isack couldn’t see me.”
Gabriel Bortoleto: “Obviously, these type of race, you need sometimes take risks, I decided to go to the mediums quite early…before the race start, I could see the track was drying, I just didn’t know how quick it was going to dry up. It didn’t dry up as quick as I thought to be honest, but it was my decision. I told the team that I want to go for it, I want to go for mediums, I feel like we can make a difference here if the track dries up quite quickly and it just didn’t pay off for me.
“I had a big snap out of Turn 1 in tricky conditions like that, we spend two laps behind the Virtual Safety Car, so getting tyres up to temperature is very difficult and I have just done a mistake, ended my race super early. I knew Turn 1 was tough because I had a big snap one or two laps before, but the track felt like it was drying up in that section and I was just too optimistic on power there. I went on power and I had a snap, it was tricky for everyone, not only for me, I have done a mistake.”
Here’s race start: https://www.formula1.com/en/video/2025-british-grand-prix-verstappen-holds-off-piastri-at-the-start-to-lead-the-opening-lap.1836907254283884952
Here’s moment between Andrea Kimi Antonelli and Isack Hadjar: https://www.formula1.com/en/video/2025-british-grand-prix-hadjar-retires-as-he-hits-the-back-of-antonelli-in-heavy-rain.1836909686892128669
Here’s George Russell on British GP strategy
Here’s Nico Hulkenberg on podium
Here’s how F1 British GP panned out
