The safety car in Formula 1: Before Mercedes, it was pure anarchy

Bernd Mayländer has a new company car: at the historic Hungarian Grand Prix, Mercedes unveiled the new Formula 1 safety car – the Mercedes-AMG GT 64 PRO 4MATIC+, with a four-litre V8 biturbo engine, all-wheel drive and 612 PS.

SPEEDWEEK.com keeps asking: How did the use of the safety car actually come about? And why is it called a ‘safety car’ in Formula 1, whereas in American racing it’s known as a ‘pace car’?

Fundamentally, the underlying concept in Formula 1 differed from that in the USA. In America, the lead car was introduced to bring the field up to a certain speed before pulling out of the way to allow the start to proceed.

In Formula 1, we have standing starts, not rolling starts as in America. In Grand Prix racing, the safety car comes onto the track to keep the field behind it at a moderate speed following an incident.

In the early days of motorsport, pace cars were also known as pacemakers or pacesetters. Their origins may not actually lie in the USA, but rather at the British oval circuit of Brooklands. Old photographs show the race director at the time, Colonel Lindsay Lloyd, often leading the field in a Rolls-Royce or Bentley as early as 1907 or 1908. It is likely that the idea was exported from there to the USA, specifically to Indianapolis. The pace car has now been a feature of American races for around 100 years.

We have been familiar with the Mercedes safety car and medical car in Formula 1 in their current form since 1996. Before that, all sorts of cars were used; the first car designated for this purpose took to the track at the 1973 Canadian Grand Prix – it was a VW-Porsche 914!

Because some of the later cars simply weren’t fast enough (the Fiat Tempra in 1993 and the Honda Prelude in 1994, to name but two), the FIA entered into a partnership with Mercedes-AMG thirty years ago. Since the 2000 season, the German Bernd Mayländer has been the safety car driver,

The first use of a safety car dates back to the 1973 Canadian Grand Prix at Mosport. Driver Eppie Wietzes, in his Porsche 914, immediately picked the wrong leader; to this day, there is still debate over who actually won the Canadian Grand Prix. Wietzes, in a yellow Porsche 914, caught up with the field following a crash between François Cevert and Jody Scheckter, but accidentally ended up in front of Howden Ganley’s Iso-Marlboro car. This allowed several drivers, including the eventual winner Peter Revson, to gain a lap.

The next twenty years were marked by anarchy: the Grand Prix organisers could do as they pleased when it came to the safety car. This led to some rather strange vehicles, as our list below shows.

In Monaco, a Lamborghini was used for years; at Suzuka, unsurprisingly, Honda cars; and in Hungary, a Tatra – one of which ran over poor Taki Inoue in 1995.

From 1993 onwards, Formula 1 regulations stipulated that a safety car must be on standby for all practice sessions and races, but there was still no single supplier. In 1996, Mercedes-Benz was awarded an exclusive contract to supply the safety car, with its first deployment taking place at Magny-Cours in 1996.

• Safety cars in Formula 1

• 1973: Porsche 914

• 1981–1983: Lamborghini Countach

• 1992: Honda Acura

• 1993: Fiat Tempra ST

• 1993: Ford Escort RS

• 1994: Opel Vectra Turbo 4x4

• 1994: Honda Prelude

• 1995: Porsche 911 GT2

• 1995: Tatra 613

• 1995: Lamborghini Diablo VT

• 1995: Renault Clio

• 1996: Renault Clio Williams

• 1996: Mercedes-Benz C36 AMG

• 1997–1999: Mercedes-Benz CLK55 AMG

• 2000: Mercedes-Benz CL55 AMG

• 2001/2002: Mercedes-Benz SL55 AMG

• 2003: Mercedes-Benz CLK55 AMG

• 2004/2005: Mercedes-Benz SLK55 AMG

• 2006/2007: Mercedes-Benz CL63 AMG

• 2008/2009: Mercedes-Benz SL63 AMG

• 2010–2012: Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG

• 2012–2014: Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT

• 2015–2017: Mercedes-Benz AMG GT S

• 2018–2021: Mercedes-Benz AMG GT R

• 2021–2025: Aston Martin Vantage

• 2022–2026: Mercedes-AMG GT Black Series

• 2025: Aston Martin Vantage S

• 2026: Mercedes-AMG GT 64 PRO 4MATIC+