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Unfortunately the biggest headlines to emerge from Belgium this weekend was not Daniel Ricciardo’s emphatic victory, becoming the first Aussie since Sir Jack Brabham in 1960 to win at the historic Spa-Francorchamps circuit.
The contact between Mercedes AMG teammates Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg was the talking point by the end of the 44-lap race, and will be the centre of debate among fans and the media until the next race in Monza.
So what exactly happened?
On the second lap of the race, Hamilton was leading Rosberg, who started on pole position for the seventh time this season. On the run into Le Combe, Rosberg made a lunge to pass his teammate and fierce championship rival.
Hamilton, who was entitled to that racing line, had without a doubt closed the door on Rosberg which in that situation and the way both cars were positioned, was right to do.
What happened next sent shockwaves through the Mercedes AMG camp.
Rosberg clipped Hamilton’s rear, resulting in the latter to sustain a puncture which ended his hopes of winning the race.
The Briton ended up retiring from the race on lap 38 after pleading with his engineer Peter ‘Bono’ Bonnington to allow him to park the car in order to save the power unit components. This was a good move from Hamilton who was a unit down to Rosberg after the fire to his chassis in Hungary qualifying.
Rosberg on the other hand finished second in the race, despite a strong final stint which saw him take more than two seconds a lap off Ricciardo’s lead. The German had to pit three times in total, with one stop seeing the team replace his damaged front wing as a result of the incident with Hamilton.
After the race things really escalated. Upon his entry to the podium, Rosberg was greeted with a reception of boos from the crowd and his team managers Niki Lauda and Toto Wolff both expressed their remorse for Hamilton and strictly emphasised that what Nico did was ‘unacceptable’.
After the intra-team debrief, with both drivers and the management team discussing the incident, Hamilton said to the press that his teammate admitted that he made that move “to prove a point”.
Was this a revenge of sorts for Hamilton not letting Rosberg past at the previous race in Hungary? Or even what transpired at the Bahrain Grand Prix?
There is a going to be a hefty amount of tension between the two teammates at the next meeting in Monza. Will Mercedes AMG have to enforce strict team orders in the future to prevent situations like this?
Until now, there was high praise for the way both Wolff and his colleague Paddy Lowe had managed both drivers. But with the stakes as high as they are, does the team want to risk more non-finishes?
The answer to that would be a solid no. Any team’s target in every race is to score the maximum available points and at the Belgian Grand Prix for Mercedes AMG, there was the potential to score the full 43, regardless of which of the two teammates won.
In the championship, Rosberg has extended his lead over Hamilton to 30 points, but with seven races to go and double points on offer at the final race in Abu Dhabi, the 2008 world champion still has everything to race for.
The question is now whether Mercedes AMG’s clear policy on ‘letting the two race’ will alter in the remaining races, in order to minimise the risk of more race retirements, which would open the door for someone like Ricciardo to creep up within 50 points of the leaders by the final race of the season.
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