Lewis Hamilton’s door slam and code of conduct after Verstappen fury – F1 news round-up

Editor 24 Oct 2023 10:00 PM

Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton in discussion.

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While there was a key staff hire at one of the teams there was also plenty of looks back at incidents involving both Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen.

And to make sure you never miss any major piece of news, you can also visit our live blog bringing all the updates as they happen.

Lewis Hamilton’s 2016 fall out with the race stewards

The life of a race steward is not often a job that gets you much praise. They are only ever really noticed when they do something wrong so when chairman of the FIA stewards Tim Mayer appeared on the F1 Nation podcast, it was an interesting look behind the curtain of one of the sport’s most important jobs.

Recalling a race in 2016, Mayer said it was one of the biggest mistakes he ever made.

“My biggest mistake ever as a steward was in 2016 [at the Spanish GP] – Hamilton and Rosberg started the race in Barcelona and they crashed,” he explained.

“Both drivers were out. We bring them in afterward. And we decide no further action in the end.

“But Lewis says to me, ‘Well, what was I supposed to do?’ As a steward, somebody who’s never driven an F1 car, I started to tell him what I thought he ought to have done.

“That wasn’t respectful of me, he got up, he was a bit mad and he slammed the door and walked out. Poor Ron Meadows, his team manager, went absolutely white in the face and said, ‘Oh, I’ll get him back to apologise’.

“I said ‘Actually, Ron, I need you to go and apologise on my behalf because it was a stupid thing for me to do’. It’s maybe not my stupidest thing as a steward but I’m not going to tell you the other ones!”

Calls made for radio code of conduct after Max Verstappen anger

Speaking of team managers, one former one has implored the FIA to introduce a drivers’ code of conduct for the radio after Max Verstappen’s outbursts in Austin.

Verstappen was becoming increasingly irate as his brake problems continued and was heard shouting at race engineer Gianpiero ‘GP’ Lambiase.

“Interestingly, he was getting very irate on the radio. I felt a bit sorry for Gianpiero, his race engineer,” Peter Windsor said in his latest YouTube stream.

“He managed to choose virtually every time he said something to Max, which was usually sort of gaps to Lewis or whatever it was, he chose a braking area when Max was absolutely focused on doing something that he doesn’t normally do and trying to get it absolutely right.

“You get the radio and they say, ‘Oh, you know, you’re four and a half seconds ahead of Lewis’. And he said, ‘Don’t talk to me while I’m braking’. He was actually expletive deleted at one point when he was talking about the brakes.

“Max, you’re the triple World Champion, you’re not allowed to do that. They bleeped it, obviously, but lots of young kids watching Formula 1 these days.

“I think there should be some sort of code of conduct to do with language. Because even young kids today know what a bleep is, don’t they? So we don’t need any more of that.”

Alpine land ex-Mercedes and Ferrari head

As their rebuild continues, Alpine have acquired the services of former Mercedes and Ferrari employee Eric Meignan.

Meignan will take over the day-to-day running of the power unit division, reporting directly to Bruno Famin, and began work at Enstone last month.

Red Bull make new wind tunnel plans after application falls through

Checking the local council planning applications in the Milton Keynes area does not often yield anything interesting to an F1 fan but a certain team did crop up there this week.

Red Bull are based in Milton Keynes and as they look to build their own wind tunnel, they would of course need planning permission but it was spotted that their application was withdrawn.

However, far from abandoning the plan, a source told PlanetF1.com that work is continuing on as normal.

Lando Norris’ car up for sale

Ever fancied owning an F1 driver’s car? Well now is your chance and not for an outrageous price.

Lando Norris has put up his “dream car” up for sale which is of course a 1972 Fiat 500 Jolly. As it is not one of the original 650 made, the car is expected to go for between £28k and £33k.