Inseparable: The Festival of Speed and Formula 1

Who’ll be driving? Well we wouldn’t want to spoil the surprise just yet, but suffice to say it’ll be the usual star-studded line-up you’ve no doubt come to expect from FOS.

Formula 1 teams first visited FOS in 1994, with Williams, McLaren and the now defunct Arrows all putting on a very fast – and loud – show. McLaren, with the Peugeot powered MP4/9, streaked up the hill with Martin Brundle at the wheel in a then-record time of 47 seconds. Brundle later said: “We actually ran the car very conservatively. If we’d set about it, swapped the hard tyres for something a little softer, I think you’d go up there in 42 seconds.” Little did he know how accurate his prediction would be, with Nick Heidfeld setting the still unbroken hillclimb record of 41.6 seconds in 1999.

It was 1996 when Ferrari first took the journey from Maranello, bringing with them the 1995 Ferrari 412 T2 and the newly-signed Eddie Ervine. Irvine’s enthusiasm off the Startline, however, created mechanical problems for the 412 T2 come Sunday afternoon.

Since then, the F1 paddock at FOS has grown and grown, featuring constructors’ and drivers’ titles winning cars like the 2009 Brawn BGP 001, the Red Bull RB7, the McLaren MP4/6 and the hybrid Mercedes W07, and drivers like Lewis Hamilton, Sebastian Vettel, Jenson Button, Mika Häikkinen, Robert Kubica, René Arnoux, Mark Webber, Emerson Fittipaldi, Sir Stirling Moss, Nico Rosberg, Sir Jackie Stewart, Jochen Mass and so on…

If you haven’t already got a ticket for the Festival of Speed this summer, make sure you get one soon. Away from Formula 1 race weekends and F1’s official events, you won’t find more F1 teams and drivers together in one place anywhere else in the world. What are you waiting for? You can buy tickets online or call 01243 755055.

Photography by Jack Terry and Jayson Fong.