Maylander in action at the 2008 Singapore Grand Prix © AP Images

He drives a silver-grey Mercedes, he has the power to make the entire grid of F1 drivers follow him and dance to the tunes of his revving engine and he is only man who no F1 driver has the guts to overtake! No, we’re not talking about Lewis Hamilton; meet Bernd Maylander the official FIA Safety Car driver for every Formula One race.

On four days of the week (Thursday to Sunday), on 17 weekends in a year, the 38-yr old former racing driver, gets the honour of overseeing the start of a Grand Prix from his safety car, placed at the back of the grid. He heads into the pits at the end of the first lap of every race and sits patiently in his Mercedes with a close eye on the race and an attentive ear to the Race Control radio, which notifies him if his services are required again during the race.

In case of an accident or bad weather, Maylander’s safety car is deployed once again and he leads the entire field of drivers on the track, during the hazardous period of the race. Maylander and his co-pilot stay in constant touch with the race director Charlie Whiting to find out the right time for them to pull back into the pits.

Although seemingly glamorous, Bernd Maylander’s job is not as easy as it appears to be. Not only has he the onus of being slow enough to keep the speed of the entire grid at bay, but he also has to be quick enough to make sure that the tyres of the F1 cars behind him don’t cool down due to the slow pace of the Safety Car period. He also has to be spot on with car control; leading the pack during a hazardous period like rain or in a post-accident scenario, he has a huge responsibility of making no mistake while he speeds around a slippery/dangerous circuit.

Since the year 2000, the German has firmly held onto the official job of driving the silver Mercedes along with his co-driver Peter Tibbetts and we hope to see him continue doing the super job that he does, for many more years to come!