Why Silverstone remains an enduring F1 drivers’ favourite  

“I got my racing licence when I went from seven to eight years old, at Silverstone. They had a little kart track set up, with a guy who reviewed your driving to see if you were safe, and I took a written test: what’s a yellow flag, what’s a green flag, right foot throttle, left foot braking, and so on. And then they gave you your racing licence. That’s my very first memory of the place and I remember it clearly, like it was yesterday. I still remember the one question I got wrong, which was “When is scrutineering?”

“Before that, I went to watch my first Formula 1 race. This was the early 2000s, the generation of Michael Schumacher, Rubens Barrichello, Juan Pablo Montoya. There was a competition at the track – you had to name the top three finishers. And I was a huge Schumacher fan so, not really knowing what was going on, I put my three favourite drivers in the list: Schumacher first, Barrichello second and Montoya third. Then on the back in case people were tied, there was a tiebreaker, something like closest fastest lap time – my dad filled that in for me because I had no clue.