Rate the race result: 2012 British Grand Prix

2012 British Grand Prix

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The British Grand Prix earned a rating higher than seven out of ten from F1 Fanatic readers, though it wasn’t quite up to the high standard set by previous 2012 races.

In a race which, against expectations, was held in dry conditions, Mark Webber overtook Fernando Alonso to claim his second win at Silverstone.

The race received an average rating of 7.048 from F1 Fanatic readers, placing it seventh out of nine races so far. Here’s what they had to say about it.

Dimitris 1395 felt the action tailed off after an exciting start:

It had a great battle between Lewis Hamilton and Alonso and the opening laps were amazing, but after the first stint it became pretty boring.

Even when Webber closed the gap and passed Alonso it didn’t have so much drama as I expected.
Dmitris 1395

BasCB thought the opposite, but was one of several unimpressed with the TV coverage:

The last ten laps or so were good. It was a shame that FOM chose to follow Webber for the last lap instead of focusing on Kimi Raikkonen hunting Felipe Massa and a few other on track battles.
BasCB

The FOM feed seemed to concentrate on the British drivers. I get that it’s the British Grand Prix, but there were half a dozen times when the cameras were fixed on Button or Hamilton while something more interesting was happening elsewhere – usually caused by Romain Grosjean.
Prisoner Monkeys

Many felt that rain would have added a little more excitement:

The first couple of laps were breathtaking and there were some good battles throughout. Webber on Alonso at the end was great.

Some rain could have made it more interesting but I wouldn’t really wish that on the fans who were probably soggy enough.
Dirgegirl

McLaren had a poor home race: Hamilton started and finished eighth while Button was eliminated in Q1 and only just scraped into the points. Their lack of pace was discussed at length:

McLaren should’ve scored more points at the beginning of the season when they had the fastest car.

Now they are behind Ferrari, Red Bull and maybe even Lotus, and the poor form of Button is really worrying.
Smokinjoe

Smifaye would have liked more variety in strategy, but enjoyed the race nonetheless:

The race was almost decided on the first lap with the tyre strategies clearly showing the best way to go about things.

I found this a shame as normally we can see at least two different ways of getting through the race at similar speeds.

However, having said that I think we saw some really good overtaking moves and proper ones at that.
Smifaye

Pastor Maldonado made headlines once again after tangling with Sergio Perez. Mrjlr93 pointed out how other drivers went into the same corner side-by-side without colliding:

As always good racing between Webber and Alonso. That’s how you race each other.
Mrjlr93

What did you think of the British Grand Prix? How did it compare to other races this season? Have your say in the comments.

Previous rate the race results

2012 British Grand Prix Rate the Race results

RaceRating
2008 British Grand Prix8.164
2011 British Grand Prix7.96
2010 British Grand Prix7.203
2012 British Grand Prix7.048
2009 British Grand Prix5.755

Browse all 2012 British Grand Prix articles

Image © Ferrari spa/Ercole Colombo

25 comments on “Rate the race result: 2012 British Grand Prix”

  1. Dimitris 1395 (@)
    17th July 2012, 16:23

    It’s actually Dimitris not Dmitris. But nevermind… ;)

    1. Changed it, sorry about that.

    2. it probably was just a typo :-)

  2. Keith, when did you change the rating system? I know it was a few seasons ago (2010, maybe). the change was subtle but significant. before, there were the 1 to 10 options but they had a description attached to each one (eg. 10 was perfect, 7 was ‘decent’, or whatever, can’t quite recall the details).

    i’ve been thinking for some time that the ratings now are higher in overall general terms than they were then, when we had the adjectives attached.

    1. As you say, it’s always been a one to ten score, the only change was that the descriptive words next to the numbers were removed which I think was at the end of 2008. The current poll still says “10 = perfect, 1 = terrible”. It would have been good to have 0 as an option but I’d prefer not to disrupt the continuity in the statistics.

      1. Drop Valencia!
        18th July 2012, 1:20

        Maybe Bahrain 2011 gets the zero?

        1. 0 for not occurring?

    2. The ratings are higher now because the races are better, simples ;)

    3. I think what we’re seeing in general is a whipsaw effect in the stats because people are now getting over excited about what they see as exciting racing compared to boring racing before. If the previous few years hadn’t been perceived as being so boring then I don’t think this years races would be getting quite such high ratings.

      All else being equal I would expect the ratings to tail off towards the end of the season as the anticipated level of excitement rises (as people are now beginning to expect the races to be more interesting) and the actual level of excitement during the races remains the same. On such a small sample set (20 races) you wont be able to adequately confirm this from the stats though, and you’re going to have some exceptional race ratings (both high and low). It’s a consequence of the human psyche.

      1. @gdog I like the term Whipsaw effect! Is that a strictly statistical term or sort of slang..
        I think this effect will be lessened on a site like this though because F1Fanatic members tend to measure their scores carefully. Judging by the comments that follow anyway.
        So they’ll rate the races relative to the many years of racing they’ve witnessed thus lessening the “Whipsaw effect”.

        And yes I just wanted to use whipsaw in a sentance :)

      2. I agree that people are expecting a bit too much! I thought the race was great, myself.

        Don’t forget though that towards the end of the season there’ll be more of a championship focus (a closely fought one, hopefully) rather than a ‘who’s going to win this time?’ feel we’ve had in the first half of the season. Personally, I can’t wait!

  3. Fair rating. A 7 would be an above average score in most seasons. Unfortunately, it is 2012 :)

  4. Valencia and Barcelona above the Canadian, Australian and British GPs. What has this world come to… :-)

    1. The world is suppose to end this year. I called ********, but after realizing Valencia and Barcelona have produced two of the most exciting races of the season, better than Albert Park, Silverstone, and Montreal; the end of the world might just be nearby!

      1. @kingshark it would be worse if it just fizzled out with a year of 1 clear WDC and boring races though, wouldn’t it? :-p

  5. 7 is a generous score…

  6. OmarR-Pepper (@)
    17th July 2012, 17:32

    yeah, quite good (or not as bad as it could be). It can sound bad but the British Gp has lost some interest in my point of view since they changed the layout.

  7. Never thought I would be looking at the rate the race results nine races in to see Valencia at the top and Silverstone towards the bottom. This season really has been unpredictable in so many ways.

  8. I also felt the tv coverage was terrible, for most of the race we were shown Hamilton going nowhere while battles were raging up and down the field. It felt like the bad old days of Host Broadcasters.

    1. You have to remember they broadcast the same feed trackside on the superscreens. Hence, it’s fair to say the british fans want to see their drivers.

      I’m sure they do the same for every top driver at their home grand prix (e.g. Alonso in Spain, Vettel in Germany, etc.)

      1. They don’t concentrate on Webber or Ricciardo in Australia.

        1. Indeed @prisoner-monkeys, they don’t, certainly not to the same extent. And to add to that, @bread-ferrari, the British fans are often considered to be the most knowledgeable, so I’d expect a larger than usual group to be very interested in other drivers and good on track action, wouldn’t you?

  9. Really enjoyed this race :)

  10. It says a lot about the exciting racing we have this season when even a last minute lead change leaves the British Grand Prix to rank seventh out of nine so far.

  11. Seems about fair to me, I think I scored it an 8. It did have a lull in the middle of the race but I didn’t mind too much.

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