'Aggressive hysterics': how Russell & Verstappen F1 row spilled out of stewards’ room

Norris in turn had noted that Lewis Hamilton was speeding in the pitlane, the Mercedes driver having had to brake suddenly when he realised what he had done.

Fernando Alonso meanwhile helpfully kept race control up to date on track limits excursions for the likes of Carlos Sainz and Pierre Gasly.

“If Fernando sees something that we have not seen, then we look into it,” Aston boss Mike Krack told me.

“And there were two or three that he mentioned that we double-checked and that we informed the race director of. So it’s teamwork. He helps us, and it helps the FIA to not make mistakes…”

Often a radio message makes no difference as things like pit speeding are flagged automatically within the FIA systems, although sometimes it does encourage race control to take a look at an incident they missed.

Where Verstappen believes that Russell stepped over the line was with his in-person contribution when they were both called to see the stewards – who in Qatar included Derek Warwick – to discuss an incident that occurred in Q3.

Russell was building up on his prep lap to start his final qualifying run when he came across a slow moving Verstappen, and had to run wide. It was unusual in that neither man was on a hot lap, but these days preparing for one is so critical that any disturbance can make life difficult.

Russell called it “super dangerous” on the radio, and felt it had potentially cost him pole.

Crucial to what happened was a related decision involving Yuki Tsunoda. After Friday’s sprint qualifying the Japanese driver was called up to the stewards for going too slowly, and while he said that he was moving over to let people by, he still landed a reprimand for failing to follow the race directors’ notes, in which the delta times are made clear.

And at the bottom of their decision Warwick and his fellow stewards made a very important comment: “The stewards advise all competitors that particular attention will be paid to adherence to the event notes in the qualifying session and that any potentially dangerous behaviour or impeding may result in the application of grid penalties.”

One team sporting director I spoke to in Qatar told me that having seen that he made absolutely sure that his drivers knew to stick to the delta time, and not hang about.

Verstappen’s rage at Russell

When Russell came across Verstappen he was not slow to make his feelings clear on the radio, and after the session he had words with the Dutch driver in parc fermé.

They were then called up to the stewards, where they got into an argument, with sources indicating that both were agitated and a bit aggressive with each other.

In Verstappen’s view Russell overstepped what you might call the driver’s code in terms of trying to get a rival into trouble. After winning Sunday’s race he made his feelings known.

“I think I really spoke about valid reasons of what happened,” he said. “And it was clear cut that around me there were different scenarios going on as well, with people having colder tyres and stuff so they had to push anyway, and I didn’t want to then cause a scene into a last corner, and then no one had a lap. So very, very surprising.”

Regarding Russell he said: “I was quite surprised when sitting there in the stewards’ room, what was all going on. Honestly, very disappointing, because I think we’re all here, we respect each other a lot.

“And of course, I’ve been in that meeting room many times in my life, in my career with people that I’ve raced, and I’ve never seen someone trying to screw someone over that hard. And that for me… I lost all respect.”

What isn’t widely known is that the discussion between the drivers continued as they walked out of the stewards’ room. I won’t repeat here the words that Verstappen apparently said to Russell, as I didn’t hear them in person. However let’s just say the gist was along the lines of should he get a penalty then George should prepare for some action at the first corner.

Unaware of this chat the stewards meanwhile debated their verdict. They probably didn’t need much convincing – Warwick plays it by the book and is strict on impeding – and in the early hours of Sunday morning the verdict came that Verstappen was getting a one-place penalty, thus swapping pole with Russell.

What the stewards said about Verstappen’s one-place penalty

“Car 1 was on a different preparation strategy to that of car 63,” they wrote. “Car 1 was well outside of the delta and the driver of car 1 explained he had let cars 4 and 14 past. The driver of car 63 claimed that he had adhered to the delta and did not expect car 1 to be on the racing line.

“He stated that if a car was going slow in a high-speed corner, it should not be on the racing line. The stewards regard this case as a complicated one in that clearly car 1 did not comply with the race director’s event notes and clearly was driving, in our determination, unnecessarily slowly considering the circumstances.

“It was obvious the driver of car 1 was attempting to cool his tyres. He also could see car 63 approaching as he looked in his mirror multiple times whilst on the small straight between Turns 11 and 12.”

They also made it clear that they had opted for a lesser penalty than they could have.

“Unusually, this incident occurred when neither car was on a push lap. Had car 63 been on a push lap, the penalty would have most likely been the usual three grid position penalty, however in mitigation of penalty, it was obvious that the driver of car 63 had clear visibility of Car 1 and that neither car was on a push lap.”

Inevitably Verstappen was left fuming – it wasn’t just losing a hard won pole, but having it happen due in his eyes to a fellow driver dropping him in it.

“I couldn’t believe that I got it,” the Dutchman said of the penalty on Sunday night. “But in a way, I was also like, yeah, I’m not surprised anymore in the world that I live in. So, you’re not happy with it.

“At one point or another, you have to just turn the page. But it wasn’t very enjoyable to see that happen, because I think that’s the first time that in a slow lap someone has been penalised.

“While actually, I just tried to be nice. So maybe I shouldn’t be nice. But the thing is that well, being nice, because at the end of the season, everything is more or less decided, for me especially, I didn’t want to screw anyone over to prepare their lap.

“And by doing that, being nice, basically you get a penalty. And that’s what I tried to explain as well. But I just felt like I was talking to a brick wall. So there’s not much that was possible, for whatever reason.”

In effect what he did overnight and into Sunday morning was channel that frustration into being absolutely determined to prove a point, which is what happened in Brazil last month after the qualifying red flag caught him out.

“I think yesterday’s penalty was more based on hysterics from George, who has been quite hysterical this weekend,” said Christian Horner. “But unfortunately I think there was a little bit of gamesmanship going on in that.

“I think he was disappointed with it. If you look at it objectively, one could argue that perhaps George was driving a little too quickly on a slow lap with two slow cars ahead of him. So maybe he was driving recklessly.

“So it was frustrating to get that penalty, but he was already motivated to win this race, and I think it only added to his enthusiasm to get off the line well.”

Tensions were ramped up on Sunday afternoon when the pair bumped into each other ahead of the drivers’ parade, where according to Sky’s Ted Kravitz Verstappen chided Russell about his “FIA mates.”

What Verstappen said to Russell after the previous night’s hearing was heat-of-the-moment stuff, or “dogs barking” as one Mercedes insider told me.

He may race hard, but of course Max was never going to do anything like what Ayrton Senna did to Alain Prost at Suzuka in 1990, and actively torpedo his rival. That’s not his style, and he had a race to win.

On the other hand if Russell had pulled the wrong move in trying to defend, then who knows what might have happened, because Verstappen was clearly in no mood to say, “after you, George.”

In the end Russell got off the line poorly and Verstappen made a clean pass, as did Lando Norris, and the Mercedes driver was left trailing.

Russell’s race-day reaction

When I asked Russell later about Verstappen being on a mission at the start he made an interesting comment.

“Yeah, to be honest, I was expecting a crash,” he said. “But ultimately we made it easy for him, because both Lewis and I made terrible starts. So it was a pretty simple overtake for him, which was a bit frustrating for us.”

However when I asked him if those concerns about a crash were related to the previous night’s banter, he didn’t bite.

“No, no concerns,” he said. “We know Max is a fighter and is aggressive. I expect no different. I really wanted to go out there and fight with him today, like we could have done in the sprint.”

All of this has to be considered in the context of the bigger picture of the change of race director from Niels Wittich to Rui Marques.

While decisions are made and penalties are chosen by stewards, and Warwick and his colleagues are an experienced team, the departure of Wittich has put an even bigger focus on any controversies.

Fuelled by social media these days, pretty much every call the FIA makes will upset somebody and trigger ridiculous accusations of bias. On Sunday Russell, Norris, Hamilton, Albon and Stroll all joined Verstappen in receiving penalties, and all we needed was a Ferrari driver in the dock and it would pretty much be a full set of disgruntled fans.

Let’s see how the Abu Dhabi finale unfolds…