This weekend we see the return of the French Grand Prix to the F1 calendar. After a 10-year hiatus Formula One returns to its spiritual home.

Click here to see some beautiful retro F1 footage from the 1962 Monaco GP.

Return to France

Most recent F1 races were held at Magny Cours, this year the event takes place at Paul Ricard. The track at Le Castellet was last used for an F1 race in 1990. Incidentally, this is the first of three F1 races in three successive weekends, a first for the sport.

Enjoy a lap of the new track with 2018 Le Mans winner Sebastien Beumi at this link.

Unusual race strategy

The return of the French race reminded us of a very unusual race strategy employed by Ross Brawn and Ferrari at the 2004 event. Brawn and his team of engineers worked out that the quickest way to complete the race would be to stop four times.

Of course, to do so meant your driver had to essentially drive four qualifying sessions, back-to-back… enter Michael Schumacher. The video below may seem like it’s on a loop, but the team did perform stop four times. In the process, they put off their rival’s strategies to claim the victory with ease.

Enjoy the sight and sounds:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMzJwW_NTKg