A CHAOTIC WEEKEND! Opinions on the Hungarian Grand Prix and Brands Hatch Accident 

Addendum: The BTCC is known for being rUBBinG iS raCInG and the home of elbows out racing. But over the years the cars have got bigger and heavier and it looks like they’ve begun outgrowing the tracks they run at. But when the WHOLE day was crash central. It made it look like a bunch of amateurs. We love a smash as race fans. But when every race is getting stopped it gets boring. Oh: and the biggie at spa too.

Marshall got killed at Brands Hatch, sub-standard BTCC race at Oulton Park, bowling fest in Hungary and Jack Aitken got sideswiped by Franck Perera at Spa. Yea that was a chaotic weekend. Deep condolences for the family left as well as fellow marshalls, and speedy recovery for Aitken.

When Grosjean had his accident, there was a chubby marshall just seconds after it, crossing the task fire extinguisher in hand and almost certainly saved RoGro's life.

Man the conspiracy theories do get tiresome. Sure, Bottas managed to perfectly calculate the correct speed and angle needed to punt Lando into Max, and then hit Checo with no steering, all while locking up the wheels to make it look like an accident, taking himself out of the race, costing himself and his teammate a very possible 1-2 finish. I blame Netflix.

I do think, in this era of budget caps, that there needs to be something like "if your driver is clearly responsible for other drivers DNF'ing, their repair bills come out of your budget cap".

You're right as ever. Hearing about that marshal really hit home and my heart broke for his family. My dad, aside from actually racing, used to marshal rallies back on the 50s & 60s - you can imagine how bloody dangerous _that_ was. No wonder Mum made him give it all up when I was born. She reckoned she could just about cope with my two older sisters as a widow, but not with another (surprise!) baby (my next sister is 8 years older than me). Given he nearly got killed at work 3 times that I know of, I didn't blame her when I found out. He was at Port Talbot steelworks (at the time, one of the biggest in the world), retired in the 1980s after _that_ strike, and health & safety was pretty much an afterthought for many bosses. One of whom got locked in a room with my dad because he refused to wear a hardhat on site. Dad was by then a head foreman and in charge of H&S for his section. The boss eventually gave up (college boy, as Dad called him, was not going to push the point too far with a 6 foot block of concrete! He did threaten to sack Dad, but that was when Dad locked the door lol), put the hat on, and believe it or don't, but a spanner genuinely dropped on his head. From a crane. It split the hat in two but the guy got away with a headache. Needless to say, he never needed telling twice after that. Or once... And yes, he was very humbly grateful to my dad! Anyway, you can probably see why I am more than in favour of every possible safety system being put in place for everyone involved in motorsports (and in general). With that sort of upbringing (Dad brought his H&S attitude home), I find it impossible to support any sport which doesn't take everyone's safety 100% seriously. I don't care what other supposed fans think, all I care about is all people involved being unharmed at the end of the day, _then_ I can truly enjoy the race. This is one of the reasons I haven't bothered with Sky, though I am absolutely in agreement with you regarding Croft in particular. Ben Edwards and now Alex Jacques were/are in it for the love of the sport, much like Murray. He made more mistakes but he loved the sport irrespective of the wheel numbers, open or tin tops... He knew his stuff and so do they. Watching highlights after the race has finished, I know I can watch it without worrying, because they wouldn't show anything fatal or just horrific on a recorded showing. Hence I was able to make it through Grosjean's horrible accident without screaming. Sadly, because I've been a petrolhead since long before the term was invented, I've seen far too many accidents I wish I'd never seen. I'm only glad I am a lot too young to have seen the tragedy in Le Mans.

Oh, I popped hard for the "Why?.... Here's why!". Love Simon Miller! I'm always looking forward for this race recaps videos from you.

Being a volunteer flagger myself, I was outraged at the fact that there could have been precautions taken to prevent the death. It is one of my worst fears to be killed while on station. You have no control of what's going on. I seriously hope that there will be serious changes after this.

The sky commentary was actually pretty good this weekend. Ironically because of nico rosberg. But yeah, crofty can be hella annoying and he makes so many mistakes.

8:47 the 24h spa crash also contributes to the curse

Gotta give credit to Russell, offering to sacrifice his race for Latifi and the team was awesome.

As a amateur driver I am fine with the risk I take. I have accepted the risks of close racing with others that can result in me braking bones or much worse. No spectators, marshalls or mechanics should get hurt in any situation, it's unacceptable. Marchalls are the heroes of our sport, we can't race without these amazing people! Please look at ways how you can stop these horror weekends, prevent this from ever happening again.

Aidan, you're brilliant, your human take on motorsport is much needed in these sensationalised times. Thank you.

The accident at the 24h of Spa was quite heavy as well. Glad everyone is ok, very glad the footage of the crash wasn´t shown on the livestream.

God the conspiracy theories annoy the living daylights out of me. Honestly I feel like if the reverse happened and Perez hit both Mercedes. People wouldn’t bat an eyelid and actually be happy about that.

The multi car crash at the top of radillion in the opening laps of the Spa 24h was also super scary and almost a recreation of the Hubert accident. Aitken and Estre were lucky that they were In GT cars

I just realized this. What if Hamilton DID enter the pit lane at the restart? "For the second time it's lights out and away- oh they are lining up from the pit exit anyway" I am still annoyed with the turn 1 incident, but looking at Ocon and both Williams at the end of the race, it might be a blessing in disguise. I am annoyed, yes, but I am happier than I am annoyed now.

Furthermore, Grosjean's crash at Spa happened in dry condition. It is far easier to make the mistake that Bottas made in the wet than it is in the dry.

I was watching the 1984 Austrian GP the other day and was stunned by the marshals just hanging back on the inside of the Bosch curve. No armco or marshal post, just grass and a lot of crossed fingers. It got really awesome when they had to mop up De Cesaris' oil in the chicane as the race was still going on. It takes a special person to volunteer for that. As for Bottas, Stroll did exactly the same thing. It's a daft mistake to make but it's a wet track on cold tyres and cold brakes. It happens.

The marshal's death left a bad feeling in the mouth this weekend despite watching 2 great races at Spa and Hungaroring. It reminded me of 2 horrible instances in CART in the 90s, both on Canadian street courses. Higher fences need to be considered for PHB after that. I love Brands Hatch. I consider it Britain's number 2 facility for motorsport, but an incident like this has been coming for a long time now and its hard to see F1 in Britain if not for Silverstone. Donnington or another dodgy street circuit would be the only real alternatives.

Great level headed video, with just enough humour at the right times. Well played Sir.

Since I can understand a bit of French I went for the Canal+ commentary that had Jacques Villeneuve. Judging by the way JV laughed, his thoughts on the Hungarian race must have been along the lines of a circus.

Without those orange volunteers, we have no racing. Horrible to see something like that happen 😢

Crofty's shrill screaming every time Lewis does anything pains me lol I'm an American so I watch F1TV which uses the Sky broadcast so I'm stuck with him, idk about you guys in the UK if you have a choice. Also, nice Simon Miller reference, he's great!

these videos cannot come soon enough. never stop, i love your content

I was sad when NBC sports lost the contract to air F1 in the US. The hosts were much better, and the broadcast was better, mostly. I really shouldn't complain because at least I can see every race. My main beef with Sky(in the US) is that F1 races aren't shown live because of unimportant crap like college basketball, or the Cornhole Championships, FFS.

There was also the big crash at the Spa 24h that involved 4 cars at Le Rouge That was censored out of the teller-cast & any highlights. They are pretending that that one just didn’t happen. Very sad what happened at Brands hatch on the weekend. It was the fact that the Flag Marshal's point at Bathurst had a catch fence around it that & just sheer luck was what saved them. Thanks for sharing 👍🏻👍🏻🙃🙃

Hi Aidan, I’m hoping to have more luck here in advancing my pet theory that Hamilton (even though he didn’t know it) was right to go to the grid because that’s what the rules say you must do for a standing start restart after a red flag if you were on the track at the time of the race suspension. It’s rule 51.11 and the phrase is “must go to the grid”. Now for the initial grid start of the race this phrase is not used in the regs and it does mention what to do if cars go in the pitlane, but this different language is in the regulations for race resumptions. Cars that were in the pits at the time of the red flag are supposed to start from there, and cars that were on the track “must” start from the grid. In my view the rules weren’t followed as they are written down. So if what we saw with Hamilton as the lone car on the grid was intended to be allowed then the rules need a redraft!

As a Redbull fan. Even I know Mercedes don't want to deal a crashgate saga. Bottas screwed up, thats all. If such a thing did ever transpire ... it would play out the same way it did for Renault/team Enstone/Alpine in 2008/2009 ...

That Oulton Park weekend was miserable. Thank you for highlighting the Orange Army. By definition they are placed at the places most likely to see accidents. Brave men and women who put most of the worlds marshals to shame.

And when Grosjean crashed at Spa in 2012 it was dry track and on Sunday when Bottas crashed it was wet track.

Millward dropping the common sense about F1 rules. The people who can't understand technical, sporting and pit stop penalties drove me crazy.

I think Hamilton would have been ok if he’d pitted. It would have been like a SC pit stop and they could have fed him out into a small gap. Other teams up the pitlane didn’t lose many places

The driving standards at the BTCC was shocking all weekend. RIP to the marshal.

Well my worlds just collided, never thought I'd see a Simon Miller reference on a racing channel lol

The incident at spa during the 24Hrs was one of the most violent and scary incidents I have seen in many years. Thankfully no was killed but for a matter of inches.....

I've thought about Mercedes' explanation of that decision not to pit, and there was a way for Hamilton to avoid being held up in his box waiting for a safe release: simply build a small 2 or 3 second gap on Ocon in the last few corners before entering the pitlane. It would have been easy as the leader is the one who sets the pace on the warmup lap.

Aitkens crash this weekend as well. Actually thought the worst watching it

Loved the Simon Miller impression 😂

A note about how Hamilton would’ve dropped back really far in the pits anyway: He probably would’ve come out ahead of Alonso as he dropped back to avoid a double-stack. He would have definitely still won.

Never expected a Simon Miller intro to an Aidan Millward video.

We had 2 cars in the Classic Touring Car race that was red flagged for that accident on Saturday at Brands Hatch. I have to correct you on your point, the entire weekend was not abandoned! At the request of the Marshals the race meeting went ahead on Sunday and at the one minute silence on Sunday morning the Marshal representative asked us to give them a spectacular race and make them proud!!! I have no words for how difficult Saturday was as a team to deal with. Equally on Sunday I have no words for how proud and humbled everyone was at the dedication of the people of the Orange Army.

Thanks for speaking about the corner workers. They really are out there doing God’s work for us drivers. So sorry to hear someone lost their life this weekend. Thank you to any Marshall/ Corner workers who read this, and thanks again Aiden for speaking about it.

2018 DTM race at the Hungaroring. Lucas Auer pinned a marshall to the wall in the pit, what a lot of people don't know is that the marshalls leg had to be amputated a few days after the incident. It's crazy to think that the drivers who drive around as fast as they can are way safer at this point then the marshalls. It appears very little is done for their safety.

It's interesting how a majority of social media fans seem to think penalties are only given when someone does something with malice intent. I noticed it massively after the Norris and Perez and Leclerc stuff in Austria. I don't understand where that came from, the fans just don't seem to understand a penalty is given for a mistake with consequences on other drivers too.

Not to add to the misery, but there was also a massive crash at Spa this weekend. It’s a miracle no one was seriously injured, never mind killed.

I´m so glad I have F1TV where I live, couldn´t watch the race live after the red flag but was easy to do it afterwards with them (and they offer commentary many languages) When i traveled to the UK I was amazed at how SKY managed to get every sport behind a paywall, at least where I live ESPN gets some races live with some ads in regular cable! Just paid premium to watch it when i travel hoenstly 0:44 Damn you made me laugh out loud there!

Well done for mentioning the Marshalls death. Puts things into perspective.

You can tell it’s a sombre BTCC weekend when everyone forgets the fact Sutton and Ingram achieved only 17 points combined and are still the top two in the championship. Again, safety rightfully getting most of the focus and not the show.

Respectfully done. Thank you

That brands Marshall post is outright dangerous. The gap faces the oncoming cars. My dad nearly got hit at that post in 85, the guy next to him was killed instantly. I’ve seen several clips of cars going through it.. it’s just dangerous

I often leave streams on in the background when I am doing other things and had your brands hatch stream on in the background as I was doing the dishes (no dishwasher in this house). Your expletive laden rant after being punted off at brands hatch sent water everywhere. Made me jump a mile. 😂

Latifi scoring more points than George "The Goodest Boy" Russell is just more pero GR is so good. Actively - proactively - telling the team to prioritize his teammate, and that he was willing to sacrifice his race to that end. I hope his test drive goes well.

A Simon Miller reference is the last thing I've expected on this channel!

Big respect to the Marshall's they do sn awesome job x

I still like having Sky Sports because it has the F2, F3 and Indycar. This years F2 season has been fantastic.

Thanks for your videos, always interesting and educational. One idea about 1 liter rule. The way it is today, it penalizes the culprit, which is the intention. And also, benefits those behind by giving the higher placing which translate in more points (if they are in the top 10). This becomes a "double impact". I think a good alternative would be to only do the penalization, and remove that car/driver, leaving the position vacant. All other drivers stay in the position they finished and get the points awarded to their placing.

Thank you so much for the honest and truthful blunt words crofted (no typo) at the start, especially as an Englishman saying it how it is about Sky, the overhyped unlucky boy and the overknighted hypocrite lucky man. Formula One is awesome again, that is so great about this weekend, even though as a Max fan (critical, not a fanboy) it hurt. Thank you for keeping us updated on BTCC!

Glad you brought this back

@Aidan Milward - having sky also means Ted havigna fake techno-throbber for Alfa having a 2mm bigger Gurney flap, or Mclaren having 7 slats instead of 6 on the foward, secondary barge board

It's about time that something akin to roll cages for drivers are created for marshalls to do their job from. Some tracks do a pretty good job of protecting them but some of the others have a long way to go. It needs to be the case for either national or FIA certification tracks that there is a set standard for protecting marshalls, racing can't happen without the whole track team making it happen and they are every bit as important as the folks behind the wheel. The same applies to crowds, I saw a video of the Verstappen accident from the crowd section and couldn't believe how much gravel was shot into the crowd who were on the other side of the location he hit the wall. There were a lot of kids in the crowd who could have been seriously hurt for the want of some perspex to line the mesh.

I think Marino Franchitti said all that needs to be said about Dave Croft. Re: safety; the collision in the pitlane was a bit of a concern. Unsafe releases need a stronger penalty than 10s. We don't need to see a car spun around in a crowded pitlane or bumped up into the prat perch area.

Tbh in Max's crash I was more worried about the tyre hitting a fan or Marshall's than anything else. I think we are past the point where we should be putting the main focus on the safety of Marshall's and other track-side workers, maybe we need some Catch Fence's on certain sections of track or just SOMETHING to protect these people.

1996 Molson Indy Toronto has to the worst example of a marshell death

Last 2 drivers scoring wins in consecutive seasons would be Leclerc 2019 and Gasly/Perez 2020

Considering how excited you could have got that was well handled Aidan, without the orange army we couldn't see these events or them even happen. The gent that lost his life was a local man to where I live. So shows how far and wide people come from to help (About 1h 30 mins from brands). Was a rather odd weekend with that happening

You beautifully summed up my feelings with regards to George Russell and Latifi. It was a great race this weekend for sure. I thought the penalty given to Bottas was harsh as it was genuinely a racing incident. The overall racing was hard but fair and great to watch.

6:57 also Grosjean was in the dry, whereas Bottas was in the wet. People will only see and hear what the want to, and they'll naturally ignore the details they don't want.

On C4's highlights coverage, every time Lewis passed a car there was an audible cheer from the crowd of some magnitude. I thought this strange seeing as there appeared to be very few Hamilton fans in attendance as was obvious from the deafening boo's he received before his dizzy spell on the podium. It crossed my mind that Liberty or whoever the broadcaster is might be adding in crowd noise for whatever reason a la football or darts 2021 style. Anyone else notice this? Just like the very old days when they used to overdub screeching tyres and over the top crash noises.

As a former flaggie, thank you for the recognition.

I turned to my standard racing accounts /subreddits this weekend after I heard something had gone seriously wrong, but all I could find was online squabbling about some unimportant thing about RB, Mercedes, Ham or Ver, I really didn't focus on it and was so exasperated with the community, even though I'm far away from the UK and had no skin in the game, it just seemed wrong about people giving inane, inconsequential POVs while nobody was actually talking about what was wrong at Brands Hatch. Amidst the chatter I did read about the accident at Spa (relieved nobody was hurt there, it was massive, as one would expect after the blind climb up the hill). Hopefully changes are made, or some way to protect the marshals happen, at least some form of life insurance, in the case something terrible happens, like in these cases. Thanks for the video, it was helpful in understanding what happened, may Robert RIP and may his family members find comfort.

Fantastic video Aidan as always buddy superb rough weekend though

That jug! 😂 Quality content right here.

The positioning of the Merc pit garage wouldn't cause that effect. If unsafe release rules are followed strictly, yes Lewis has to wait til everyone passes before exiting his pit box, but they're all still pulling into their boxes/getting their tyres changed when Lewis is released. The same rule (applied strictly) means cars further down the pit lane can't be released until exiting cars have passed. What actually happens, is cars are released wherever a small gap appears, and apart from the odd move up or down one or two positions, the order stays more or less the same - except for drivers who pull in directly behind their own team mate. Those are the ones who get screwed. Lewis would almost certainly have exited the pits somewhere in the top 4. He didn't pit because it's a much bigger decision if you're the first one in. Everyone else could take the start as normal. Once a couple of drivers do it, it's a lot easier to follow.

Not exactly the question you asked, but 3 drivers won their first race on 2008, and all 3 made up the podium in Monza that year. Kubica, Kovalainen and Vettel.

Its Oracle Millward and chill time

If your gunna quote Simon then ya gotta slap your head and point at the camera. I swear how is this channel not bigger , your funny and always give great reviews .

The drivers with wins in successive season can be LeClerc to Gasly for 2019 to 2020 or if you don't want to count that then its Verstappen 2016 and Bottas 2017.

The Brands Hatch incident was brutal to watch :/ weird weekend all round race wise.

Didn't expect a Simon Miller reference but happy nonetheless

The last time we had first-time winners on back-to-back seasons was Max 2016/Bottas 2017.

Not going to lie. Whenever I seen that crash first thought in my head was this is going to blow up big time.

So Vettel's car did not provide a sample and thus failed the post race dope test.

Chaz Mostert crash the marshalls jumped out the back of the post.. I was there that weekend and the back of it is about a 3m drop at about an 80-degree angle and they just jumped as it was a tonne and a half of race car barrelling at them

10:06 also the 2013 Canadian Grand Prix where a tractor run over a marshall whilst carrying the car of Esteban Gutierrez

RIP Brands Hatch Marshall

If Lewis hadn't have taken to the grid, when would the other have been allowed to leave the pitlane? Given you can only leave the pits once every car has passed, what do you do if there are no cars? Would it just be a race straight out the pits, or would they tell them to line up on the grid in the order they leave the pits, or reshuffle them again to the order they were in when the red flag was flown? Is there written a rule for it?

@Aidan Millward, Over the past couple of years my home circuit has started to use what we call FIA holes (pun intended) it is a slot in the fence big enough you can stick your arm out of to wave the flag but small enough that there is no way a wheel makes its way into a station. Bad for visibility but good protection. I also have seen more and more marshals, in exposed areas like starter stands and places that need better visibility, encourage helmets. Although they are not required by many series that I flag, I expect at least a 1/2 to 3/4 helmet to be mandatory in the next several years depending on the station

The comments about Bottas doing a Singapore 2008 are so ridiculous. Stroll took out Charles and also Daniel at T1, but no one cares because it isn’t the title fight.

I shouldn't have watched the crash at brands but i did.... I think we have a mentality problem in motorsport.. Spa was a miracle.. We play with physics limits and are in my opinion just lucky nothing massive happend the last 10 years... MotoGp and its junion series' have nearly one fatal per year. Too much grip and that packracing is the problem there. And cars are way to fast cornering GT3 are flying....Spa again! Something has to change. There are people involved, everybody has to relalise that. Close and hard racing has nothing to do with speed in my opinion. Thank you

Tbf to Latifi him and Russell do have similar pace on Sundays but overall yeah Russell is outperforming his Williams but I’ve also noticed the improvements that Nic has made since his debut.

Couple thoughts..... Does Bottas blow past his braking point if Norris does not cut him off in the rain. Yes, its 100% Bottas' fault but I recognize how he would have gotten blinded by the spray momentarily. I feel bad for Red Bull if they didnt whine constantly of late. That racing between Alonzo and Hamilton was so damn fun to watch. That was absolutely brilliant. Two masters of their craft going all out, racing hard and will full respect of each other. So good. Great racecraft by both of them. As for the BATC race..... My deepest condolences to the marshal and his friends and family. Motorsports are dangerous and theres substantial risk for not just the racers but the spectators, support crews, media, and track workers around a circuit when you have cars traveling at high speeds. Despite the safety innovations for the drivers, there will always be a human cost when drivers fail to respect each other on the track. I won't even get into the horrific crash at the 24 hours of Spa at the top of Eau Rouge. Just a bad weekend all across motorsports.

The 24hrs of spa too A tragic, crazy week.

This weekend race had a lot of stuff I liked, it had drama with merc and red bull, underdogs surprises, and Alonso and lewis battle was amazing, and that ocon win beautiful, and very sad for Sebastian DSQ but it is what it is.

As an interesting side note even track days are getting more violence and general bad driving over the last 12 - 18 months. I've heard of several cases if people ignoring black flags, in one case causing a red flag which was still ignored eventually leading to the whole track having to be blocked. There has been a few cases of people getting into physical fights with marshals or other drivers. It's almost as if there is so little respect in the whole of motorsport in general that its starting to become silly.

With the Vettel fuel thing. Leclerc was disqualified for having more fuel on board that what was really in the tank. So I doubt Aston Martin would lie about the amount of fuel added to the car. So if X liters was added, the fuel flow sensor measured Y liters being used. X-Y-Z This is what Aston Martins defense is based on. The FIA are saying these fuel flow sensors are accurate and since the Ferrari gate in 2019, I would assume the two sensors being used can be checked together. So the sensors showed how much fuel was used, Aston Martin have told the FIA how much fuel they added. So this is why aston martin say there is 1.4liters left in the tank.

Why has nobody mentioned the monster accident of Jack Aitken at Spa?

>The Hungarian Grand Prix was chaos, the BTCC was chaos, and at the BARC race at Brands Hatch it was tragedy. Indeed. Thankfully, the 4-car crash at 24 hours of Spa at least resulted in injuries alone.

Ooh, that font made it look like the FIA had to take 1.01 something of fuel from the car, not 1.0L

2019 and 2020 - Leclerc and Gasly & Perez. The Hungaroring has seen the maiden victories of a few drivers - Hill (1992), Alonso (2003), Button (2006), Kovalainen (2008), and Ocon (2021). The first 3 all went on to win the title within a few years, so could it be a good omen for Ocon?