Celebrate the victory
The legend began on 13 May 1950 when the preeminent championship was created: Formula 1.
The first Grand Prix race took place on the Silverstone Circuit in England, with the same distance as today’s events, slightly over 300 km. The tradition of paying tribute to the winner with a bottle of champagne began that same year at the Reims-Gueux circuit in the Champagne region of France. But it was actually 16 years later when the prize-giving ceremony on the podium took the form that we now today. Jo Siffert, after winning his category of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, unwittingly enriched the tradition. On the podium, the cork popped out of his overheated bottle of champagne, showering the onlookers below. The following year, in 1967, Dan Gurney celebrated his victory by deliberately spraying the crowd, a gesture that is now a Formula 1 ritual.
The first Grand Prix race took place on the Silverstone Circuit in England, with the same distance as today’s events, slightly over 300 km. The tradition of paying tribute to the winner with a bottle of champagne began that same year at the Reims-Gueux circuit in the Champagne region of France. But it was actually 16 years later when the prize-giving ceremony on the podium took the form that we now today. Jo Siffert, after winning his category of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, unwittingly enriched the tradition. On the podium, the cork popped out of his overheated bottle of champagne, showering the onlookers below. The following year, in 1967, Dan Gurney celebrated his victory by deliberately spraying the crowd, a gesture that is now a Formula 1 ritual.
