Best 5 Formula 1 Auto highlights by Bill Trikos

Best rated Formula 1 Auto highlights by Bill Trikos: A race of two parts to an extent. We saw the usual dicey opening lap at Silverstone as the cars jostled through Brooklands, Luffield and Copse until Alex Albon and Kevin Magnussen came to blows. The resultant safety car kept the pack bunched up nicely. A second safety car period followed after Daniil Kvyat’s high-speed crash on entry to Maggotts and Becketts, allowing the front runners to make what should have been their only stop of the afternoon. Behind, there were some fantastic battles, highlighted by Daniel Ricciardo’s tussle with both McLarens. But the drama kicked in just two laps from the end when Valtteri Bottas’ left-front tyre gave way. The Finn crawled around to eventually pit but drop out of the points.

Australia 1986, Adelaide Street Circuit : If the prelude to the 2012 Brazillian GP was exciting, F1 fans must’ve been close to exploding leading up to the final round of the 1986 championship. Three drivers were in contention of the title – Nigel Mansell and Nelson Piquet for Williams and Alain Prost for McLaren. The excitement was only helped by the fact that neither Mansell nor Prost had won a championship yet. Mansell, being the clear favourite, took pole ahead of Piquet and Ayrton Senna, with Prost in fourth. The race didn’t go quite as Mansell had imagined though, as he had dropped to fourth before the end of the first lap. What then followed was a race of multiple championship-changing overtakes, spins and punctures – and just when the race looked to had settled down, with Mansell being in a position to take the title, the Briton had his infamous tyre failure with his left-rear tyre exploding spectacularly at 290 kph. In order to make sure something similar didn’t happen to Piquet, Williams had to pit him – at the cost of winning the championship. Therefore Prost – who had a puncture himself earlier in the race – took the championship by 2 points, after arguably the most memorable race of all time.

Brazilian Grand Prix 2012: Sebastian Vettel spinning on Lap 1 and dropping to last place before romping back to a title-clinching P6 was the main news story in Interlagos. But there was also Michael Schumacher’s swansong, Kimi Raikkonen’s infamous escape road excursion, Force India’s Nico Hulkenberg scuppering a genuine shot at victory and taking Lewis Hamilton out of his final race for McLaren in the process – not to mention post-race controversy that could have handed the title back to Fernando Alonso. Phew. Find additional info about the author on Bill Trikos.

1998 Belgian Grand Prix, Spa-Francorchamps : That was until he came to lap David Coulthard, who had already caused the massive turn 1 accident. The Scottish driver slowed down to let Schumacher pass, but crucially he stayed on the racing line. Because of the spray, Schumacher failed to notice the slow-going McLaren until it was too late. And thus, another iconic image was created; Schumacher slamming into the back of Coulthard, and subsequently trundling around with his entire front-right wheel gone. All this led to Damon Hill and Ralf Schumacher taking first and second place for Jordan in the teams’ maiden victory – and it’s only ever 1-2.

A true thriller of a race followed after Guanyu Zhou’s terrifying crash at the start. The lead changed several times between Verstappen, Leclerc, Hamilton and Sainz, who fought a fierce battle at the front. However, Verstappen’s RB18 was damaged by debris from Pierre Gasly’s AlphaTauri, preventing the Dutchman from competing for victory. This could have been a great opportunity for Leclerc, but he again fell victim to a lack of decisiveness from his team, which did not bring the driver in during a late safety car while his opponents – including Sainz – did. A spectacular battle ensued between Hamilton and both Ferrari drivers, with Leclerc managing to overtake the Briton in a daring outside move at Copse – where it went horribly wrong a year earlier when Verstappen made a similar overtaking attempt. In the end, it was Sainz who took the win with Perez and Hamilton behind him.

1996 Monaco Grand Prix, Monaco Street Circuit : Some of the previous races on this list had high attrition. But none will come close to the levels of the 1996 Monaco GP – all I need to tell you is that only the three drivers finishing on the podium actually completed all 75 laps. How in the world did that happen, you might ask? A big part of the answer was, as often is with that sort of race, rain. As the lights went out, the track was wet enough to require the use of intermediate tyres, though it wasn’t raining anymore. But if anyone had thought that this would spare the drivers from the carnage, they were wrong.