Formula 1: Silverstone, the British Grand Prix and Watching F1 from London

How the championship works

Two titles are decided every season. The drivers’ championship goes to the individual who scores the most points across the year; the constructors’ championship adds together the points of both cars from each team, and it is the one that determines how the sport’ prize money is shared out. A team can lose the drivers’ title and still consider the season a success if it wins the constructors’.

Points go to the top ten finishers in a Grand Prix on a 25-18-15-12-10-8-6-4-2-1 scale. Anyone finishing eleventh or lower scores nothing. The bonus point for setting the fastest lap was scrapped from 2025, so finishing position is now the only thing that counts.

A standard race weekend runs three practice sessions, a knockout qualifying session that sets the grid, and the race itself. Six weekends in 2026 use the sprint format instead, replacing a practice session with a short Saturday race that pays points on a separate 8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 scale to the top eight. Silverstone is one of the six sprint rounds in 2026, which makes the British round a two-races-for-one-ticket weekend.

What changed for 2026

2026 is the biggest technical reset the sport has attempted in more than a decade, and it changed both the cars and the shape of the grid. The power unit is still a 1.6-litre V6 turbo hybrid, but roughly half its output now comes from the electrical side rather than the engine. The MGU-H, the complex heat-recovery component that deterred new manufacturers from entering, has been removed entirely, and the cars run on fully sustainable fuel.

The chassis rules changed alongside them. Cars are shorter and narrower than the previous generation and carry less downforce, and DRS has been replaced by active aerodynamics, with front and rear wings that change shape on the straights and in the corners. The intent is cars that follow each other more closely without a single overtaking button.

The commercial effect was immediate. The grid expanded to eleven teams for the first time in years with the arrival of Cadillac, running Ferrari power units under a customer deal; Audi took over the Sauber operation and now builds its own engine; Ford returned in partnership with Red Bull Powertrains; and Honda committed to Aston Martin. For spectators, the practical consequence is a grid of 22 cars and a competitive order that took time to settle after the rules changed.

Silverstone and the British Grand Prix

Silverstone has a claim no other circuit on the calendar can make: the 1950 British Grand Prix held there was the first race of the first Formula One World Championship. The British and Italian Grands Prix are the only two events to have been staged in every season the championship has run, and although the British round rotated through Aintree and Brands Hatch for parts of its history, it has been Silverstone’ alone since 1987.

The race is secured at Silverstone until 2034 under a ten-year extension agreed with the circuit and its owner, the British Racing Drivers’ Club, so this is a fixture worth planning around rather than a one-off. It is also one of the largest sporting events staged in Britain, drawing crowds of around 140,000 on race day, and that scale is the single biggest factor in how you should approach the logistics.

Grandstand choice matters more here than at most circuits, because Silverstone is fast and open and the character of the viewing changes enormously between the high-speed sweeps and the stadium complex. Silverstone runs the same grandstands for its bike racing, so our Silverstone seating guide breaks down the sight lines venue-wide, with the caveat that it is written around the MotoGP weekend rather than the F1 one.

Getting there from London

There is no railway station at the circuit, which is the fact that catches most first-timers out. The nearest stations are Milton Keynes Central and Northampton, each roughly 15 to 18 miles away, and both are served by official shuttle buses on event days that drop within a couple of minutes’ walk of the gates. From central London the realistic shape of the journey is about an hour on the train to Milton Keynes, then the shuttle.

Driving is viable but needs planning. On-site parking is limited and has to be pre-booked, so most people use the park and ride sites at Sixfields off the M1 and Turweston off the M40, both of which include the return shuttle. National Express and Megabus run official coaches direct to the circuit gates on Grand Prix weekends.

Whichever way you travel, arrive far earlier than feels necessary — the approach roads queue badly and gates minus sixty minutes is a minimum rather than a target. Our Silverstone transport guide covers routes, shuttle timings and departure planning in detail, and the Silverstone bag policy sets out what you can and cannot bring through the gates, which is worth reading before you pack a rucksack.

Why so much of F1 is built near London

Formula 1 is a global championship run largely out of a corner of southern England. Six of the eleven teams on the 2026 grid operate from bases within striking distance of London: McLaren at Woking in Surrey, Williams at Grove in Oxfordshire, Aston Martin at the Silverstone circuit itself, Red Bull Racing at Milton Keynes, Mercedes at Brackley and Alpine at Enstone.

Racing licences do not always match geography — Mercedes races under a German licence and Alpine under a French one, while both are designed and built in England — and several of the remaining teams run UK facilities alongside their main headquarters. The cluster is usually called Motorsport Valley, and it is the reason a disproportionate share of the sport’ engineering, wind tunnel and manufacturing work happens within an hour or two of the capital.

F1 in London itself

London does not host a Grand Prix, and no amount of periodic speculation about a street race has changed that. What the city does have is the simulator racing venue at F1 Arcade, where the format is competitive stints in full-size simulators rather than passive viewing — the closest thing to driving the circuits without leaving zone 1.

For the races themselves, the capital watches on screens. Grand Prix start times vary enormously with the calendar, from early mornings for the Asian and Australian rounds to late evenings for the Americas, and that shapes where you can find a venue showing them — a Sunday afternoon European race is easy, a 6am lights-out is not.

London does host its own single-seater championship round. Formula E races in the city and is the closest thing the capital has to a home Grand Prix, with our Formula E London guide covering the event, plus dedicated transport and seating pages for the practicalities.

Frequently asked questions