Masters Historic reconvened at Brands Hatch for its traditional self-organised Masters Historic Festival on the final weekend of May, this time coinciding with Whitsun. For the first time in its history, the organiser brought six grids to the meeting – a new record – and all were blessed with sunshine lighting up the Kentish green hills across which the old-school racing circuits undulates its way around.

1973 is probably the least popular of all 500s, and among Indy fans it is the one year they like to forget about as soon as possible and as quickly as possible. Based on the headlines and main stories of the year, it is indeed an Indy edition that simply can not be rated positive in any way. Nevertheless, when taking a deep dive into the stats and figures of this race, something does pop up. Something that may make you realise that in your eager to ignore and forget 1973 as much and as quick as possible you never noticed before.

Having run its big spring event mainly for the local German and Dutch-based historic series, the Bosch Hockenheim Historic a.k.a. the Jim Clark Revival upped the ante for 2023 by inviting over Masters Historic Racing to present a strong international single-seater line-up that also included HSCC F2 and the Lurani Trophy. It was rewarded with 23 3-litre Formula One Cars, which made some 60,000 spectators flock to the Baden-Württemberg track across the three days of the event. The sun was out from Friday to Sunday, and at temperatures mimicking hot summer days, with the notable exceptions of Friday and Sunday’s late afternoons. On Friday, second Formula One qualifying was washed out while on Sunday the final three races on the programme drowned in the deluge of a lengthy thunderstorm that wouldn’t go away until well into the night.