The British motorcycle Grand Prix takes place at the iconic Silverstone circuit in Northamptonshire this weekend, with the teams running special retro colour schemes to celebrate the 75th anniversary of world championship Grand Prix racing.
The first world championship race took place on June 17 1949, at the Isle of Man TT Races, and the 11 teams making up the 2024 MotoGP championships will race in liveries reflecting the history of their teams and manufacturers. Unusually, the liveries will be revealed together and to the fans during a special event at the Day of Champions, the historic prelude to the British Grand Prix, which takes place on Thursday and hosts a hive of auctions and activities to raise funds for the Two Wheels for Life charity. The liveries will be unveiled during the Day of Champions pit walk at 2pm, with a one-hour documentary set to follow.
On track there will be plenty of interest as the fastest bikes and riders on the planet make their only appearance of the year on British asphalt.
It’s been a pretty hectic season so far, with some big rider changes being announced – most notably the eight-time world champion Marc Marquez’ switch to the factory Ducati squad for 2025, with race winner and title contender Jorge Martin moving from Pramac Ducati to Aprilia. The transfer market has also gone beyond the riders, with the Pramac team announcing it will switch to Yamaha as part of a reported seven-year deal from 2025.
Francesco Bagnaia (pictured), champion in 2022 and 2023, leads the title race coming to Silverstone, 10 points clear of Martin. Marquez lies third and is keen to secure a first win on his 2023 specification Gresini Ducati.
There are a whole host of riders capable of winning, although sadly there will be no Brits on the premier class grid. Yamaha test rider Cal Crutchlow was due to make an appearance as a wildcard entry, but he’s not sufficiently recovered from a recent operation to take his place. Britain’s hopes lie with Jake Dixon in Moto2, the CFMOTO star coming to Silverstone on the back of a challenging season, and Scott Ogden on the MLav Racing Honda in Moto3.
Silverstone are again laying on a big show to create a festival atmosphere with some well known bands providing the nighttime entertainment, most notably rockers The Darkness – who headline on Sunday night.
There will be support classes in the form of the British Talent Cup and the Pirelli National Superstock championship, the latter featuring TT stars Davey Todd, Peter Hickman, John McGuinness and Josh Brookes. The superstock riders will be running out of the National Pits area and the area will be open to fans. The superstock teams will be setting their garages up in a reversed formation, meaning spectators can get up close to the bikes and see the mechanics working inside the pit boxes.
Tickets are still available from the Silverstone website and, for those who can’t make it in person, all sessions of the Grand Prix classes will be broadcast live on TNT Sports, while ITV will be showing all the races. The free-to-air broadcaster will show Saturday’s Sprint race and Sunday morning’s Moto3 outing on ITV4, while the MotoGP and Moto2 races will be on the main ITV1 channel from 12:15 on Sunday.
Photos: Ducati
