Eight of the greatest pranks in Formula 1 history

When cars hit the track and the visor goes down, Formula 1 drivers shed the personalities they may adopt outside of the track — but when the race is over, there’s no telling what they’ll do!

The intensity of F1 lends itself well to some equally intense pranks and, in honor of April Fools’ Day, we’re looking back at some of the wildest pranks in the sport’s history.

Niki Lauda’s discarded ear

Ah, Niki Lauda.

This story has been passed around in a few different forms, so it’s not quite clear which one is the most accurate, but it goes a little something like this:

At the 1976 German Grand Prix, Lauda was seriously injured when his Ferrari burst into flames upon crashing into a barrier.

Lauda only spent a few weeks recovering before he returned to the race track, and he was left with ample scarring — and a lack of an ear.

Ahead of the 2006 German GP, Lauda accompanied Bernie Ecclestone to the corner of his crash, the two poking around in the grass.

Some fans asked what they were doing, and Ecclestone replied that they were “looking for” Lauda’s missing ear.

The Germans were disgusted… until Lauda picked up what looked like a charred ear and held it out for them to see.

Lauda is said to have pulled a similar prank later in life; while being interviewed by an American TV crew for the release of 2013’s Rush, a journalist asked him how he felt. Lauda responded, then suddenly bent down to pick something up from the grass.

“Look what’s here!” he exclaimed. “My ear!”

The television crew was apparently stunned into silence, only for Lauda to confess that the “ear” was actually just a partially eaten cookie he’d tossed into the grass.

Nelson Piquet’s toilet paper prank

At the 1987 Mexican Grand Prix, Williams Honda driver Nigel Mansell fell ill with some kind of stomach bug that saw him diving into the pits regularly during practice to relieve himself.

Team-mate Nelson Piquet noticed Mansell’s strange behavior and decided to have a little fun.

He snuck into the bathroom while Mansell was otherwise occupied and stole away with all of the toilet paper — something Mansell failed to notice until he was seated on his porcelain throne.

Gerhard Berger vs. Ayrton Senna

Between 1990 and 1992, Gerhard Berger and Ayrton Senna were McLaren team-mates, and the two were constantly trying to pull pranks on one another — so many that they could fill a post of their own!

Many know of the briefcase story, where Senna was flaunting his new carbon fiber briefcase in a helicopter en route to the Italian Grand Prix, talking up its indestructibility.

Berger decided to test that statement by tossing the briefcase off the helicopter!

Or, there was the time that Berger replaced Senna’s passport photo with an image of, erm, male genitalia.

Senna tried to cross into Argentina with the offending image and was subsequently detained for 24 hours — but he got his revenge by supergluing Berger’s credit cards together.

Then there was the time Senna filled Berger’s shoes with shaving cream on the night of an important dinner with Honda executives, to which Berger replied by trying to offer Senna some orange juice mixed with sleeping pills before the Japanese Grand Prix (Senna denied the cocktail).

Once, in Australia, Berger unleashed 12 frogs in Senna’s hotel room, and when Senna attempted to confront him, Berger asked, “Did you find the snake?”

Senna’s response was to wedge some smelly cheese into Berger’s air conditioning unit.

There was never a dull day with those two!

Rubens Barrichello’s fart box

Speaking to the Flow Podcast, Rubens Barrichello admitted that, once, he placed a fart box beneath Michael Schumacher’s chair during a Formula 1 briefing.

“It was a small thing,” Barrichello recalled, “the size of a phone, emitting a sequence of farts. Sebastian Vettel liked it a lot; he still talks about that gadget!”

More iconic F1 pranks:

👉 The hilarious Nico Rosberg prank played by Michael Schumacher and Sebastian Vettel

👉 How Fernando Alonso wound-up Ron Dennis…with a giant peach

Sebastian Vettel and Michael Schumacher vs. Nico Rosberg

In the pre-race press conference ahead of the 2012 German Grand Prix, Sebastian Vettel pranked Nico Rosberg with a little help from Rosberg’s Mercedes team-mate Michael Schumacher.

The drivers were asked about their working hours during a weekend, and Robserg was the first to answer — revealing that his microphone volume was cranked high. Vettel immediately turns to Schumacher, both men breaking out into mischievous grins.

As Rosberg continues to speak, Schumacher leans in to whisper something in Vettel’s ear. Vettel then leaned over and moved the mic closer to Rosberg’s mouth — which only made Rosberg louder, and his voice more distorted.

Vettel and Rosberg both burst into laughter, as did the drivers behind them.

Max Verstappen’s taxi driver

One recent prank was organized by Channel 4 in 2021.

In it, Max Verstappen climbed into a taxi driven by a disguised Steve Jones, only for that driver to “confuse” Verstappen with Michael Schumacher’s son and spout off a litany of other incorrect motorsport facts.

At one point, cameras caught Verstappen texting Red Bull about his abysmal taxi driver experience; upon realizing he was being pranked, he let out a few curse words before saying, “I was really getting upset. I was really trying to be nice, but I was like, oh my god. This was my worst-ever taxi experience.”

George Russell’s Abu Dhabi dinner predicament

The end of the 2024 Formula 1 season saw Mercedes driver George Russell fighting with Red Bull’s Max Verstappen after a near-miss in qualifying at Qatar.

A war of words ensued, with Russell stating he wouldn’t be “bullied” by Verstappen, while Verstappen referred to Russell as “two-faced.”

But when the drivers gathered for their annual end-of-season dinner ahead of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, their fellow drivers felt a prank was in order.

Russell was the final driver to arrive for dinner, and the rest of the grid made a point of leaving just one open seat for him: Right next to Max Verstappen.

Per the BBC, Verstappen waved and said, “Hi George,” before motioning for Russell to sit down.

Russell said hello, but he quickly moved one of the empty chairs away to seat himself next to his Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton.

It was certainly a cheeky move by the fellow drivers to stoke the flames of the rivalry, but it does beg the question: Had Russell sat next to Verstappen, could they have quashed their beef over dinner?

Sergio Perez’s power prank — and his team’s response

Sergio Perez debuted in Formula 1 with Sauber back in 2011, and the season was a challenging one.

In the first 14 races of the year, Perez had only scored at three grands prix; that was to change in Japan, where he fought up the grid from 17th to finish eighth.

Keen to have a little fun, Perez radioed his team on the final lap to shout, “I lost power! No power! No power!”

His race engineer advised him to “go to the finish line, keep pushing!” only for Perez to start laughing.

He clarified that he was joking after he crossed the finish line.

In turn, Perez’s engineer informed him that his team-mate Kamui Kobayashi had finished fourth, not 13th as expected — which completely caught Perez off guard.

He clarified that his engineer did indeed mean P4, then asked, “Why?”

“So I got you as well, Checo, OK!” the engineer responded. “You got it back now!”

Read next: F1 driver nicknames: From Princess George, to Britney, and the Pampas Bull