COURTESY of Toyota’s Timo Glock, David Coulthard had rather more time to talk than he expected at Silverstone last week. Approaching Stowe corner on the final morning of the three-day test in preparation for next Sunday’s grand prix, the young German unaccountably failed to see Coulthard’s Red Bull steaming up the inside, and the resulting crunch when he turned in meant an extra hour or so in the pits for both drivers.

The cost to Coulthard, in terms of valuable test laps lost in preparation for his 238th grand prix, was considerable. Returning to the immaculately neat motorhome that has been his retreat at most European races and tests for the past 10 years, however, Coulthard was smiling. At himself, as it happened.

“I went stalking off down to their garage ready for a spot of finger pointing, but as soon as he saw me he just started apologising,” the Scot explained. “Took the wind right out of my sails. And I was going to finish by telling him Germany had been really lucky against Turkey, too.”

Having calmed down, Coulthard reflected on the current generation of drivers trying to make their way in Formula One. “I don’t know how much of their capacity is used driving the car, but I would suggest the greats – and I’m absolutely not putting myself in that category – have always had spare capacity, an awareness of what’s going on around them.

“I would say some of these young guys don’t seem to know what’s happening around or behind them, which is almost as important as what’s happening in front of them. It’s either in you or it’s not. We can all learn from our mistakes, I suppose, but with some of them it’s going to be bloody expensive until they do.”

Some might find the 37-year-old’s initial anger hard to understand. In the 18 years he has been driving F1 cars, he has lapped Silverstone thousands of times. What else can he possibly learn about the art of finding the quickest way around the Northamptonshire circuit?

A great deal, Coulthard explains. “If you go out into the pit lane today, you’ll feel a strong tailwind down the straight which means we arrive in the first corner 10kph faster,” he said. “It sounds like nothing, but on Tuesday there was a headwind and people were flat through the first corner. Today and yesterday, we have to lift.

“I’m not sure whether people understand how sensitive to conditions these cars are. Wind, air temperature, the condition of the track, it all makes a real difference. The same car will be a different machine on a green [unused] track to the way it drives when that track is rubbered in. You have to adjust each time you go out. A track on the Friday of a grand prix weekend is totally different by the race, when it may be three seconds a lap quicker.”

For Coulthard, that he spends his working life on the edge searching for a limit that is always changing is one of the main reasons he is still driving. Nothing is ruled out, he says, including, in due course, running a team. Maybe even his own team. Once the sale of the Columbus, the hotel he part-owns in Monaco, goes through, he jokes, he might look at buying Toro Rosso, Red Bull’s sister team, currently on the market.

“Buying it wouldn’t be the scary thing but finding £100m a year to run it definitely would,” said the Scot. “I’m in the middle of a GP season and I have some clear plans but that’s not one of them at the moment - you can’t go straight from primary school to university, and to presume I could go straight from driving an F1 car would be arrogant.”

Coulthard fears next year’s regulation changes will make life more difficult for the privateer teams, who are continuing to put most of their resources into developing their current cars, while manufacturer-backed teams pour money into next year’s machines.

Red Bull are punching well above their financial weight to lie fourth in the constructors’ championship, ahead of Toyota, Renault and Honda, with Coulthard’s third in Canada their best result of the year.

It was a welcome boost for the Scot after seven races in which his performance in qualifying was making him look second best to teammate Mark Webber.

“What I’ve been trying to do in the first half of the season is no different to what I’ll be trying to do in the second. The way F1 is these days you tend to run around in your starting position, so that suggests we need to look at our strategy. Take France last week. The team chose to pit me on lap 26, and Mark on lap 23, in other words when we went into the final qualifying session [when cars must lap carrying their race fuel] I was weighted towards being at the back end of top 10 and starting outside the points.

“We need to allow me the chance to start higher - you’re more likely to stay there. Look how difficult Lewis [Hamilton] found it in France.”

Contrary to one recent newspaper story, he is adamant he does not dislike Hamilton. “He hasn’t done anything I haven’t done already so there’s no jealousy. I admire success. He’s a talented guy and it’s not as though I’m racing against him. He’s up there and I’m down here.”

Even so, Coulthard admits he raised his eyebrows at Hamilton’s prickly reaction to criticism of his mistake in Canada. “Lewis has got to be careful because it’s never going to be plain sailing,” he said. “He’s come into F1 in a very privileged position, which I did as well, and started with a winning car. It makes it a hell of a lot easier, people say you’re good because you’re running at the front. Just because you have a quick car doesn’t mean you’re going to win every race.”

Another points finish next weekend in front of his own supporters - there will be many a Saltire flying at Silverstone - would be a satisfactory result.

“Testing here suggests we’re in there fighting with Toyota and Renault again,” said Coulthard, “so if you have the top six pretty much decided, we’re all battling for seventh or eighth. It isn’t easy, but then it never has been.”