Raikkonen breaks Schumacher’s points streak record

2013 British Grand Prix stats and facts

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Kimi Raikkonen finished in the points for the 25th consecutive race in the British Grand Prix, breaking Michael Schumacher’s record.

Raikkonen has finished in the top ten in every race since last year’s Bahrain Grand Prix.

Schumacher finished in the points for 24 races in a row from the 2001 Hungarian to the 2003 Malaysian Grand Prix. But as noted last week points were not offered down to tenth place when Schumacher set the old record.

Unsurprisingly, Raikkonen did not seem at all interested in the record when it was pointed out to him.

The ten longest points-scoring streaks in F1 are now as follows:

DriverRacesFirst raceLast raceEnded by
Kimi Raikkonen25Bahrain 2012Britain 2013Still running
Michael Schumacher24Hungary 2001Malaysia 2003Crash (spun in rain)
Fernando Alonso23Europe 2011Hungary 2012Crash (first-lap shunt)
Sebastian Vettel19Brazil 2010India 2011Puncture
Michael Schumacher18San Marino 2003Spain 2004Crash (hit lapped driver)
Fernando Alonso18Turkey 2005Germany 2006Wheel failure
Fernando Alonso17China 2006Belgium 2007Crash (spun in rain)
Carlos Reutemann15Belgium 1980Belgium 1981Gearbox failure
Mark Webber14Brazil 2010Belgium 2011Crash (front wing went under car)
Sebastian Vettel14Singapore 2012Canada 2013Gearbox failure

As noted above, Vettel’s run of 14 consecutive points finishes came to an end in yesterday’s race when his gearbox failed.

It also means no driver has completed every racing lap. Raikkonen and Hamilton have the most with 492 out of a possible 493 (Raikkonen was lapped in Canada, Hamilton in Spain).

Nico Rosberg claimed the third win of his F1 career at Silverstone. He now has as many wins to his name as Mike Hawthorn, Peter Collins, Phil Hill, Didier Pironi, Thierry Boutsen, Heinz-Harald Frentzen, Johnny Herbert and Giancarlo Fisichella.

He needs two more wins to match his father’s tally. Keke Rosberg never scored a victory the British Grand Prix but he did the non-championship 1978 BRDC International Trophy race at the track in a Theodore, leading home Emerson Fittipaldi in his own team’s car and Tony Trimmer in a Melchester-run McLaren.

Lewis Hamilton claimed the 28th pole position of his career. It was his second pole position at Silverstone following the one he took in his rookie season six years ago.

Hamilton has the best average position in qualifying (before penalties) so far this year on 2.38. Vettel is next on 2.88, then Rosberg on 3.13.

It was Mercedes’ 14th pole position giving them as many as Tyrrell. The two teams are connected as Tyrrell’s F1 entry was purchased by British American Racing, which later became Mercedes by way of Honda and Brawn.

Hamilton set a new record on the current configuration of Silverstone with his pole position lap. He stopped the clock at 1’29.607, eight-thousandths of a second quicker than Vettel’s 2010 pole position time.

However the fastest lap of the race, set by Webber on the final lap, was 2.6 seconds slower than the lap record of 1’30.874, set by Alonso three years ago. It is the second race in a row Webber has set the fastest lap, the 16th of his career.

We now know Webber has just 11 races left to run in his F1 career. Daniel Ricciardo, one of the drivers who’s been tipped to replace him, chose the right time to achieve his best qualifying result to date with fifth following Paul di Resta’s exclusion.

Romain Grosjean out-qualified Raikkonen for the first time this year, leaving Vettel and Hulkenberg the only drivers to have beaten their team mates in all eight qualifying sessions so far. Jules Bianchi has beaten Max Chilton seven times but was unable to set a time in Monaco.

Williams celebrated their 600th race start, which they will officially reach at the next race in Germany. Disappointingly for them although they scored their best result of the year (Pastor Maldonado 11th, Valtteri Bottas 12th), they still haven’t scored any points so far this year.

Pirelli were probably not celebrating the 250th F1 race in which they have supplied tyres to at least one team. Their tyres won the first world championship race on Giuseppe Farina’s Alfa Romeo.

After leaving the sport Pirelli made a brief and largely unsuccessful comeback in the eighties and nineties, winning three races. They have been F1’s official and sole tyre supplier since 2011.

Hamilton became the fifth driver in F1 history to exceed 1,000 points. However as noted earlier this year it’s a rather meaningless milestone.

Finally, the British Grand Prix was the first race after Mercedes were charged with conducting an illegal test for Pirelli. A central point in the row is whether Mercedes gained an advantage from the test.

The teams’ points chart shows a clear rise in Mercedes’ points-scoring rate since the test. They scored 14.4 points per race before the test and 33 points per race after it.

Review the year so far in statistics here:

Spotted any other interesting stats and facts from the British Grand Prix? Share them in the comments.

2013 British Grand Prix

Browse all 2013 British Grand Prix articles

Images © Lotus/LAT, Daimler/Hoch Zwei, Williams/LAT

Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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75 comments on “Raikkonen breaks Schumacher’s points streak record”

  1. Carlos Reutemann’s streak of 15 consecutive points finishes in 80-81 is mightily impressive – the cars are so much more reliable nowadays!

    1. @jh1806 Williams had the FW07 going extremely well at that point, and of course the Cosworth DFV engine and Hewland gearbox were very tried-and-tested components

      But the tracks were far more punishing then, there were more cars on them and various other hazards, all of which serve to make it a very impressive achievement for its time.

    2. @jh1806 exactly my thoughts ! Impressive !

      Sad he’s not rated that high as a driver over here… and all is forgotten as he’s a political leader.

      1. @fer-no65 Yeah he was a pretty good driver..I believe he deserved to win ’81, but Jones would not repay the previous year’s debt, and Reutemann made one silly error at the last race and Brabham won their first Drivers’ trophy in 14 years..

        1. Unless I’m mistaken Reutemann’s record was set when only the top six positions earned points. I wonder what the others’ stats would look like if translated to the 1980-81 points system?

          1. Schumacher was on the podium every race in 2002, so he would have broken Reutemann’s record regardless. But as Keith’s article a while ago showed, Kimi would not have broken Schumacher’s record under pre-2010 points.

          2. @wsrgo Max has been insanely good in karting the past 2 years, but some people are a little worried how much of an influence Jos is. Jos tunes Max’ engines and karts and has done so for a lot of drivers, including Giedo van der Garde way back in 2002 or so. They would have to find a good team in lower formulae for Max, because Nyck de Vries also dominated karting, but seems to be hitting a roadblock in FR2.0..

          3. @npf1 Yeah, Nyck did great last year, but this year there seems to be a bit of malaise around Koiranen’s entire 2.0 campaign. I guess it would be best if instead of such a big jump, Max was put in the new 1.6 championship. Any F1 team involvement (via junior team), might be welcome too.

    3. I don’t care as long as someone able to reduce M.Schumacher name from the record book and wikipedia. His nickname was schummel schumi.

  2. Since the start of 2010, all bar 1 of Vettel’s retirements have come from the lead!
    Australia 10
    Turkey 10 (he had just got his nose in front when they hit so I’m calling that one too!)
    Korea 10
    Abu Dhabi 11
    Valencia 12
    Monza 12 (not from the lead)
    Britain 13

    Why can’t his car pack up when he’s 11th in Malaysia or 15th in Spa? :)

    1. To make it more dramatic.

      And interesting. Honestly, this race went from outrageous to acceptable due to the nail-biting finish the late-race caution provided us with – just as it does race by race in NASCAR.

      Had Vettel run away with victory for the umpteenth time in his most usual fashion, the race would have had a dull finish.

      And I’m still not saying this because I ‘hate’ Vettel. I don’t like him, true, but here I just simply described how his DNF from the lead made the race more interesting (well, ignore the first two sentences, they merely served as cheeky intros). It made it dramatic a lot of other times too.

    2. Yup, he would have ran away with the title in 2010 if not for car trouble while in the lead. His record is truly astonishing.

    3. I’d like to add that Vettel was in the lead in Bahrain in 2010 when he had a mechanical problem that ultimately led to him finishing 4th and gifted the win to Alonso.

      Then you had Hamilton being careless and giving him a puncture on the first corner.

    4. In recent years, Silverstone has had a knack for producing different winners. Nico Rosberg is the 11th different winner of the British GP since the year 2000 – the only other circuit with as many winners in that time frame is Monaco. Coincidentally, Rosberg is also the 11th different Monaco Grand Prix winner of the 21st century, too.

      This was also only the second race of the year (after China) in which the race winner won after making 3 stops. The other races have all been won on 2 or 4 stops.

  3. I pointed this out in the live chat too. There are lot of similarities between this race and Hungary 2008.
    The pole sitter (HAM in both cases) had a tyre failure which set him back, the driver in third (VET yesterday, MAS in 2008) led most of the race before having a race-ending failure at the end of the race. The driver in second, who was the pole sitter’s team-mate (ROS yesterday, KOV in 2008) got the victory handed to them by these misfortunes of others.

    1. Tyre_Shredder
      1st July 2013, 12:12

      Spooky stat! that race in 2008, Hamilton finished in 5th!!!

      1. But he finished 4th this time so what is your point?

        1. Maybe the next time a race is similar to Hungary 2008, he’ll finish on the podium?

  4. I’m sure Hamilton has now gone back ahead of Vettel in career points if you apply the current system to all of their results since 2007. Vettel had overtaken Hamilton for the first time in Canada.
    Edit: Hamilton 1380 Vettel 1376

  5. Alonso has scored 111 points after 8 races both this year and last year, while Vettel has 132 this year and 85 last year.

    1. Kinda says a lot about people who think Alonso hasn’t had as good a year so far…

      1. He indeed had a worse year y/y in terms of performance. Last year, he was faultless during this entire span, but this year he made a mistake into T2 in Sepang and was strangely off-song, or 90% in Monte-Carlo.

        Last year, he was at his brilliant best, ouncing every bit of a dog car at the beginning of the year to perform on 110%.

      2. Last year he had McLaren, Williams and Sauber taking points off him.
        This year, they’ve been rubbish.

  6. McLaren’s sixty-four-race run in the points ended at Montreal. I don’t think anyone really cared about that. But they also didn’t score at Silverstone.

    When was the last time McLaren failed to score points in consecutive races? It was in 2009, and they went four races without points. Neither Hamilton nor Kovalainen scored at Spain, Monaco, Turkey or Britain.

    1. @erikkennedy And an addition to your stat there..
      McLaren went four races without scoring in both 2004 and 2009. In both years, one of their drivers had at least 1 race win, whereas the other had no podiums. Both times, the guy with no podiums (Coulthard in 2004 and Kovalainen in 2009) was sacked at the end of the season. Extrapolating, it means that if McLaren have 2 more non-scores, but somehow improve their car (like MP4-19B or the MP4-24) and one of the drivers win, the other will leave McLaren at the end of the year…

  7. Unsurprisingly, Raikkonen did not seem at all interested in the record when it was pointed out to him.

    That started me with a wry smile. Then a good laugh. i can imagine his reaction.

    1. I saw an interview with him yesterday where he was very obviously seething about Lotus’ mistake in missing a final pitstop opportunity. It was obvious to me at that point (in the race) that Webber and Alonso were both going to hunt him down in the final 7 laps without any difficulty. I wasn’t that surprised when Hamilton was able to as well – but had not predicted that. There were two cool things about this though. One, it was awesome to see Lewis, Alonso and Kimi at one point, all in a line racing, at the end of a race. Secondly his very obvious frustration showed just how committed he is this year.

      Anyway, I digress, he was then asked if “beating Michael’s record made up for this in any way”. His answer was a deadpan “No.” and the interview was over immediately. :D

      1. More interestingly than the immediate emotional reaction could be the impact the error will ultimately have on Kimi’s decision for 2014.

  8. Isn’t the 600th race for Williams actually in Germany? They just decided to celebrate it in their home race.

    1. I think that depends on whether they decided to count that race at Indianapolis where only 6 cars started or not- Williams left the grid on the formation lap but pitted before the race start.

      1. Peter Windsor also mentioned in The Racers Edge that up for consideration are the 1980 Spanish GP, 1981 South African GP and the 1982 San Marino GP – all related to the FISA-FOCA war.

  9. Hamilton has the best average position in qualifying (before penalties) so far this year on 2.38. Vettel is next on 2.88, then Rosberg on 3.13.

    This is particularly interesting. Lewis, I believe, now leads Nico 5-3 in qualifying.

    But people remember Nico’s streak of three consecutive poles more, I guess, so the above stats add depth to their performances, I think.

    Nico performed just at the right times.

    1. Indeed, a lot seem to think Nico has had the upper hand because he’s had more poles, and more wins, despite being out qualified and out raced 5-3.

      1. @jleigh Hamilton outqualified Button 14-5 in 2011. Did that make him the better driver that year?

        1. @wsrgo no, but he didn’t out race him to the same extent, and score more points like he has dome this year compared to Nico

          1. @jleigh But if Nico finished in Australia and China, and not been ordered to stay behind his teammate in Malaysia, he might have been ahead. Clearly, those weren’t his faults.

  10. Didn’t Alonso’s points streak ended in Belgium 2012?

    1. That’s right!

      But Keith mentions the last race in which they scored points, so Hungary is correct.

    2. @andrew345612, The tables state not the race it ended, but the final race in which the streak was continued.

      1. Duh, I feel like an idiot now.

    3. There are a lot of mistakes on that list. Off the top of my head, Alonso finished 2007 Belgian GP in 2nd or 3rd IIRC. Vettel won the inaugural race in India. And Alonso finished 6th in last year’s Hungarian Gp.

      1. As stated, the list shows the last race of the streak. Thus, when Alonso was hit in Belgium last year, the streak ended. Therefore the race before (Hungary) was the last race in the streak. So the table is correct.

      2. @shrieker
        Keith shows the last race the driver fineshed in the points. Right before their streak-ending non-scoring.

        1. its still wrong for belgium 07 tho as alonso finished both Spa and the race later at monza

          1. Kyle (@hammerheadgb)
            1st July 2013, 21:37

            Monza was the race before Spa in 2007.

          2. you are right, i stand corrected.

  11. Chris (@tophercheese21)
    1st July 2013, 13:58

    Kimi doesn’t care about this… Lol.

    He said so, to Nat Pinkham haha

  12. brief and largely unsuccesful

    I wonder if in 10 years we will look back at this Pirelli era in the same way.

    1. But they’ve won every race for 2 and a half years………………………

  13. The first back-to-back pointless races for McLaren since 2009 with the dog of a car. Turkey and Silverstone (it was a 4-race streak)

    1. I should read above comments in future, ignore this! My error!

  14. Looking back, if you apply the top 6 points system, Raikkonen’s best consecutive points steak was only 9 races – 2012 European GP to 2012 Korean GP.

    If you count races where he finished (i.e. exclude retirements), he had a run of 18 finishes in the top 6 – 2002 Canadian GP to 2003 Japanese GP (there were however 8 retirements in this time).

    Looking back at the figures, I’d forgotten that in that 2002 season Raikkonen had 10 retirements! 6 finishes were in the top 6 and the other finish was 12th in Brazil.

    1. ‘Looking back, if you apply the top 6 points system’

      Interestingly though, if you do the opposite and apply the later points rule to MSC, his streak isn’t any longer.

    2. 12th place was a classified retirement from a spin caused by a loose wheel.

  15. yuya (@john-locke)
    1st July 2013, 16:36

    Alonso is simply awesome.
    He recorded 17,18,23 consective points finishes !! Very impressive!!

    1. Chiz (@a-flying-toilet)
      1st July 2013, 16:59

      Best Driver of the modern era

      1. The modern era presumably running from around 2005 to 2009?

    2. @john-locke
      I do apologise… I read that as 171823 consecutive points finishes (with random commas dotted throughout), and started writing a comment of disgust at the suggestion that Alonso has been playing since the dawn of time :P

  16. Pardon me but the observation that its three races since the Mercedes test is not a “stat.” And the reference to changes in average points as a figure whose variance is explained by the test is a mighty reach. Are we going to beat this horse until November and then start talking about asterisks? As far as the “stat,” filed in the category of other relevant varabiles, things would look different if not for an incredibly rare car failure by Vettel yesterday and a decent start from Webber. One might also subtract a mechanical DNF for Rosberg in China where Hamilton finished 3rd. Furthermore, neither Monaco or Canada were fully relevant for an estimation of whether Mercedes are now better on their tires than before. At Silverstone, they were better. But we are now 8 races into the season and who would have discounted the possiblity that Mercedes, with their legion of technical directors, would not crack this nut sooner or later? It’s not like they had a slow car that’s become fast. They have the fastest car on the grid, that they are learning how to set up properly.

    1. @dmw I think the average points finish is absolutely a completely relevant statistic: it is possible that had Hamilton not had his puncture they could’ve finished 1-2 and had Hamilton performed better in qualifying at Monaco they could’ve finished 1-2 there as well. In Canada they were also better than they had been.

      It could be purely coincidental but they were found guilty bear on mind so were obviously deemed to have contravened the regulations (and hence gained an advantage). So it’s a very noteworthy statistic.

      1. Literally, it is a statistic.
        Scientifically (rationally), it is not a statistic.
        It is true that these things happened, but it does not provide conclusive reasons WHY these things happened. My gut tells me Mercedes got an advantage from their “private” test, but it is too soon for a valid statistical analysis (if such an analysis is possible). Opinions, on the other hand, are the beginning of knowledge…

        1. ‘Scientifically (rationally), it is not a statistic.’
          Science is not rational. Science is absolute. It is a valid stat because it is a direct before and after.

          ‘it is too soon for a valid statistical analysis (if such an analysis is possible)’
          They gained an advantage. This was the argument used by the FIA lawyer. Even if Merc learn nothing they learn something because they learn that they don’t need to change anything.

          In science, the only way to not learn something is to not perform the test in the first place.

  17. Surprised no one mentioned this (or if they have I missed it), but if Schumacher had not crashed out in the monsoon that was Brazil 2003, he would have had a 43 race points streak, and a 33 race top-6 finish streak.

    1. now that is a valid and amazing statistic :D

  18. With the victory of Rosberg, car number 9 became the 11th number in F1 history to exceed 1,000 points.

  19. 5th consecutive Silverstone podium for Webber – most podiums at any circuit for him. He has also always finished a different position to where he started.

    Second year in a row that Vettel has retired from the lead in the race after Canada. In both races, Grosjean failed to finish due to a similar problem and there were a lot of position changes in the last few laps (including Webber charging up the field).

    Alonso breaks his 2013 pattern of finishing on the podium in alternate races.

    Rosberg has never had exactly 1 podium in any season.

    All drivers have now been classified ahead of their team-mates at least once this season. Webber, Gutierrez, and Chilton are still yet to start a race ahead of their team-mates.

    2 of the 3 closest finishes since the start of 2012 have involved Rosberg and Webber (Monaco 2012 being the other), and all 3 have involved a current Red Bull driver and a current Mercedes driver (USA 2012 being the other).

  20. Typical reaction from Kimi. No wonder they call him the the Iceman.

  21. Vettel has not won a single Grand Prix in Europe since Sept 11, 2011 (22 months) – Italian Grand Prix 2011.
    He has taken part in 11 European races since then but not won a single one.
    He has won 11 Grand Prix and 2 championships in these 22 months.. but no European race win.

    1. Well I hope we have a 20 race calendar soon all in Asia/Middle East!

  22. I keep updating the all-time top scorers list (modern points/race started) after every GP. Only one change yesterday. In Canada Seb Vettel overtook Michael Schumacher for the 5th position, but in Silverstone he gave it back. Hamilton, Alonso and Raikkonnen maintain their 8th, 11th and 14th positions.

    1. Traverse (@)
      2nd July 2013, 11:04

      I keep updating the all-time top scorers list (modern points/race started) after every GP.

      I admire your dedication to the cause! :)

  23. For the second year in a row the car that started on pole and won in Monaco started from second at Silverstone and won

  24. Some more from magnetimarelli.com:

    The only other driver to have managed 5 consecutive podiums at Silverstone is Raikkonen.
    First time Hamilton has managed 4 consecutive front-row starts since Germany-Italy 2011.
    First time since 2007 that neither Red Bull has been on the front row in Silverstone.
    Only the third top 5 start for a Toro Rosso – following Italy 2008 (when they qualified 1st and 4th).
    18 races without a front-row start for Alonso – equals his worst run (2001 + first race of 2003).
    Ferrari started in the same positions (9th and 11th) as in the 2009 race.
    500th race with a Ferrari on the podium.
    Vettel has led 10,000km – only the 5th driver to do so (after Schumacher, Senna, Prost, Clark).
    First time that Force India have managed 3 consecutive double-points finishes.
    Neither Red Bull car has officially been overtaken in the last 5 British GPs (I believe the official stats exclude lap 1, pitstops and mechanical failures).

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