The British Grand Prix
Silverstone, 20th July 1995

Deputy Herbert gets his reward

This is the Autosport race report on Johnny's first Grand Prix victory at Silverstone on 20th July 1995. Many thanks to the magazine, writer Nigel Roebuck, photographer Martin Elford, and to fan Harry Lythgoe for sending us this from his collection of old Autosports.

When Hill and Schumacher clashed, Their team mates took over the victory fight - and Johnny Herbert took top prize.

For most of the afternoon it was Schumacher and Hill, as usual, although for once a battle to the flag was in prospect, the Williams tracking the Benetton closely. Too closely in fact. With 15 laps to go, the two of them had what Damon referred to as a racing accident, and in seconds he and Michael were climbing from damaged cars beached in the gravel trap on the outside of the left handed Priory. In truth, Hill’s attempted overtaking move had looked more then a touch ambitious, but perhaps, on Sunday, Schumacher gained some insight into Hills feelings last November in Adelaide.

Step forward the deputies, 45 seconds behind the leading pair, Messrs Herbert and Coulthard had been in a fight of their own, for third place, and now this necessarily assumed a rather greater importance. Two British drivers, both yet to win in Formula 1, and here was the British Grand Prix up for unexpected grabs.

This time the issue was resolved not by an accident, but by the rulebook. On his second stop, David, without a speed restrictor on his Williams, exceeded the pitlane speed limit, which automatically entails a stop/go penalty. By the time this had been served, Johnny’s position was relatively secure, although Alesi’s Ferrari was not far behind.

In the Parc Ferme, Jean embraced Johnny, he knowing more then most, what it means to win your first GP. “Big ‘eadaches for 3 days” he said. Herbert said he could live with that. “The long hard slog had been worth it...”

Before practice, Gerhard Berger was as ever, realistic about his chances. We were starting to close the gap to Williams and Benetton. “We were not quite up with them, but we were getting there in little steps. At Magny Cours though, Renault introduced the new engine, and for sure, this is a big step, I think”

Berger likes Silverstone, though, and invariably goes well here. In qualifying, he alone got up amongst the Renaults, but he suspected that, although he didn’t want one, a wet race would give the Ferraris a serious chance.

On Sunday morning, it looked as though they might have one, the forecast was for sunny periods with showers. The track was dry for the warm up- and here we had a big surprise, for it was not Schumacher, not Hill, not a Renault powered car which set the fastest time, but Mika Hakkinen’s McLaren, powered by Ilmor's very latest Mercedes V10.

Only one was available, and it arrived late on Friday, Hakkinen took no part in Saturday's wet qualifying session, so it was not until the warm-up that he was able to give it a run. Perhaps his time was flattered by new tyres, but nevertheless it was highly encouraging for the somewhat beleaguered team. As with Renault's RS7B, this looked like 'a big step'.

Behind him, in the warm-up, were Hill and Coulthard, Alesi and Berger, and then Schumacher. Afterwards, Michael said that he hadn't been pushing, but rather concentrating on fuel consumption checks, and Damon reported himself well satisfied with his car's set-up.

Half an hour before the start it began to rain, but stopped almost immediately so that by two o'clock the track was largely dry. From pole position Hill got away splendidly, but Schumacher untypically lagged a little, and fell victim to a bullet start by Alesi. Into Copse it was Williams, Ferrari, Benetton, and although Michael took a stab at second place into Stowe, Jean confidently held his position.

Hill, seeing red rather than bluey-green in his mirrors, could scarcely believe his good fortune, and immediately set about capitalising on what might be a very temporary delay for Schumacher. At the end of the first lap he led by a little over a second, and five laps in, he was ahead by more than six seconds. This the crowd liked very much indeed.

Michael emphatically did not, however, for it was something of a new experience for him. While Damon charged away into the middle distance, he was left between Alesi and Coulthard, and quite unable to extricate himself. Robbed of clean air, Schumacher's Benetton could not run close to the Ferrari to mount a serious attack. And every time around Hill was another second away.

Others were in trouble. After only two laps Irvine pulled off at Stowe:

"It was a problem with the crank sensor," Eddie said. "I’d made a bad start because my clutch overheated, and started slipping, and I lost some time while I let it cool. After that I got a bit impatient, trying to catch up I spun. Then the engine stopped, and that was that."

Irvine's team mate, Barrichello, and Panis had problems of another kind. As at Magny-Cours, both were adjudged to have jumped the start, and again both adamantly denied the charge.

"I definitely didn't move before the green light," said Rubens, "and I think they have to look at the system a bit more, and take into account the situation when a driver has an automatic clutch and a semi-automatic gearbox - when I put the car into gear, it jumps forward a bit."

Olivier was baffled: "Another stop/go penalty for a jumped start - I wish I could understand what is happening."

After 10 laps Hill's lead was out to 11 seconds, and Schumacher remained apparently powerless to do anything about it. If - if - their pitstop strategies proved to be similar, Damon was indeed looking good.

If Schumacher was stuck behind Alesi, so Coulthard was also unable to make any progress, and Williams decided to bring him in early for fuel and tyres. This was lap 15, and David got on his way again after 11.4 seconds.

"As soon as I left the pits, I had some sort of electrical failure, which meant that I had no automatic blip on the downshift, and on the upshift it felt like a slipping clutch. I really expected that my race was going to be over at any moment, and it amazed me that we made it to the finish."

Another consequence of the electrical problem was that Coulthard now had no pitlane speed limiter; this would be crucial later in the afternoon.

Martin Brundle traditionally runs a strong race at Silverstone, and, after an excellent start, was running seventh, when he spun into a gravel trap on lap 17.

"For a few laps before I went off, the car had become harder and harder to control, and I began to wonder if maybe a shock absorber had broken. When I spun, I was only just in the gravel, and I'd kept the engine running, but I couldn't get the car out."

Schumacher's prayers were answered on lap 18, when Alesi made his first stop, and at last the Benetton had clean air before it. Hill's lead was out to almost 20 seconds by this point, but immediately Schumacher began to cut it back, albeit not by chunks.

Lap 21 saw the end of Berger. Unlike Alesi, Gerhard made a poor start, thanks to a clutch problem, but he had recovered well, and was running fifth when he made his stop. Considering that he was stationary for 13 seconds, there should have been ample time for the Ferrari mechanics to complete their work efficiently, but as soon as Berger got back on the track, he realised that his left-front wheel had not been properly fitted, and he could only pull over and park on the grass. All the Ferrari luck is apparently with Alesi in 1995

By now Hakkinen was gone too, but the problem was not with the McLaren's new Mercedes engine. 'On about the 10th lap, I started having an electronics problem, which affected a lot of things on the car, and eventually the gearbox, clutch, hydraulics, everything started to fail, and I had to pull off. Mika had been running fourth at the time, and later he was genuinely encouraged by the significant, if long overdue, improvement in his car's competitiveness.

Hill came down pitlane at the end of lap 22, and resumed, after an 11 second stop, in second place but at this stage of the game none in the Williams pit can have been too concerned, for Schumacher was only nine seconds ahead, and this Damon began to reduce. As well as that, Michael would surely be in soon, for his team mate had made his stop on lap 21, and invariably Benetton operates the same strategy for both its drivers.

Hill, however, had reached a different conclusion: "When Michael wasn't by Alesi within four or five laps, I began to suspect he must be running a lot of fuel."

Herbert's pitstop had been a particularly good one, enabling him to get out ahead of Alesi and Coulthard, whom he had tailed for the first part of the race. Jean, indeed, had come out of the stops particularly badly, for David, too, had got ahead of him, and he now found himself a disconsolate fifth.

"From that moment," he said, "I was unhappy, and started to give up, because I had lost my motivation"

Alesi? Giving up?

"Yes, because there are so many long, quick corners here, and you can't get close to another car, because then you lose downforce. Overtaking is therefore almost impossible - I knew that from the early stages of the race, when Schumacher was behind me, and not able to challenge.

Hill initially trimming back Schumacher’s lead a little was now fading away. More to the point, Michael was still out there, still running strongly, still on his first set of tyres. When was he going to stop? Was he - deep breath - going to stop only once? That was exactly the plan. On lap 31 - of 61 - Schumacher came in, and the stop was a lengthy 13.4 seconds, indicative of a large fuel intake. By the time that he resumed the race, Hill had of course gone back into the lead, by 20 seconds, but Damon had another stop to come, and if he were to make it without losing first place, he’d need a bigger advantage then that. Thus he began cranking out a series of new fastest laps, and by lap 40 was in front by 27 seconds- still not enough.

Herbert made his second stop at that point, and on lap 41 Hill came in. As he exited the pitlane, Schumacher swept by into the lead, and the chase was on. Twenty laps remained, and Damon's tyres were fresher than Michael's.

A little way behind them, Herbert and Coulthard were into a similar fight, but for now that was of secondary interest. Everyone's eyes were on the 2 drivers that have dominated Formula 1 for a year now, and Hill was plainly on a mission, quickly wiping out Schumacher’s advantage, and moving up close to the Benetton's tail. But would he be able to find a way by?

It is a sad fact of contemporary Formula 1 that one expects, in this situation, that one of two things will happen: either the cars will run in formation to the finish, or they will have an accident. Given the extreme difficulty in overtaking, it is almost unknown for a car cleanly to pass another of comparable performance. One felt it with Brundle and Berger at Montreal, and one felt it now.

It happened on lap 46, at Priory Schumacher apparently entered the corner on an unusually wide line, and Hill, apparently from too far back, lunged down the inside. At the apex of the corner, the Williams hit the side of the Benetton, and both cars were turfed briefly into the air, coming to rest in the gravel trap. Initially, anyway, Schumacher was incensed.

"I think what Damon did was both stupid and totally unnecessary There was no room for two cars there, and it's not an overtaking place. If I hadn't been there, I think he'd have gone straight on into the gravel. He just came from nowhere. Even in front of your home crowd, I think you have to keep your temperament under control.

"It was more or less the same situation as in Adelaide last year, where he also tried to dive inside where there was no room..."

At this point, a lot of the sympathy for Schumacher began to evaporate. The circumstances in Australia were entirely different, as no one knows better than Michael, and for him even to raise the subject seemed an act of some gall. That said, most were astonished by the announcement later that both drivers had been severely reprimanded by the Stewards, and cautioned that "future similar actions may result in severe penalties".

Hill was unrepentant afterwards, and saw no need to be otherwise.

"I thought I saw an opportunity that I could take advantage of, but I'm afraid Michael, is a harder man to pass than that, and we had an accident - which I would describe as 'a racing accident'."

Benetton and Williams honours were now in the hands of Herbert and Coulthard, and right royally they went at it, too, if only briefly. For either man, this would be a first Grand Prix victory, and not just any Grand Prix, either, but naturally the one every Briton most wants to win. For three or four laps, the two cars were as good as tied together, Coulthard ducking this way and that in his efforts to get by. Finally, after Gachot and Frentzen had got in the way, he managed it, on lap 49.

It was academic, though. When he had made his final pitstop, David, without his pitlane speed restrictor, had exceeded the limit, and for that the punishment is a stop/go penalty

"In some cases, it's good to have these giant TV screens around the circuit," David said, "but sometimes I hate them, and today was one of those times, because- I saw: 'Coulthard: 10-Second Penalty'. At that point, the team hadn't radioed the message to me, and I thought: 'Maybe they won't tell me, and it'll just go away.' Apparently, they didn't want to disappoint me immediately - it was two laps before they told me."

Herbert, in fact, knew of the penalty before Coulthard did.

"They told me on the radio about it just before David came up to pass me, and that took away a lot of the pressure, of course. Those last 10 laps were incredible, I must say. I felt so much support from the fans, waving their flags everywhere, but I kept telling myself, 'Hang on, it's not over yet, because anything can happen'."

Coulthard came in to serve his 10-second sentence at the end of lap 51, giving up not only the lead on the road, but also second place, which now went to Alesi.

At the front, the issues were therefore settled, but there remained the tussle for fourth place between Blundell and Barrichello. The Jordan was plainly faster than the McLaren, but Mark was in resolute mood, and not about to be passed in the dying laps of the British Grand Prix. Again, it was no surprise when the cars touched...

"Rubens had closed up on me when I was held up by Martini for more than two laps," said Blundell. "In the end I defended my line, and Rubens hit the back of my car."

The McLaren's left-rear tyre was punctured, and the car limped over the line on three wheels, but the Jordan went on to have an accident of some violence. "We can't go on giving away opportunities for points-finishes like that," mused Eddie Jordan, but his driver was rather more virulent in his comments.

"Blundell wasn't fair in his driving," Barrichello said. "Twice he brake-tested me, and then, when I came up to overtake him, he moved over on me. I am really upset - that's something I would never do."

Happy days. Well, at least for Johnny Herbert.

"This morning the official odds on my winning were 25-1, and I asked everyone I knew to bet on me, but I didn't do it myself. I should have had more faith in myself, shouldn't I?"

It was a lovely drive, devoid of mistakes, and a result richly enjoyed in the pitlane, as well as in the stands.

Many thanks to Autosport and the writer for the above report. All rights reserved.
The series of historic reports comes to you from the archives of fan Harry Lythgoe
This page prepared 14th January 1999.