It wasn’t a classic, but a nonetheless intriguing Mexican Grand Prix gave Formula One plenty to consider in the final month of the 2016 season.
After 71 laps of the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez the result was only partially clear – grievances were yet to be aired and penalties were still to be applied.
Lewis Hamilton took the chequered flag ahead of teammate Nico Rosberg, but the battle for third was hotly contested, with Max Verstappen the first to cross the line ahead of Sebastian Vettel and Daniel Ricciardo.
A late-race Vettel lunge on Verstappen had the Dutchman locking up and cutting turn one, enabling him to keep the lead.
So blatant was Verstappen’s advantage that even the most necessarily biased observers, namely the Red Bull Racing pit wall, suggested he surrender the place as per sporting convention, but Verstappen decided against remedial action.
Vettel wasn’t happy.
“Move! Move, for f**k sake!” he shouted over team radio, hoping race control would hear his frustration and right the wrong. “He’s just backing me off into Ricciardo!”
Whether Verstappen’s intention or not, Ricciardo found himself close enough to launch an attack on the Ferrari at turn four, resulting in a collision when Vettel appeared to move in the braking zone.
Attacked from behind and faced with a stubborn Verstappen ahead, the German went into meltdown. “You know what, here is a message for Charlie [Whiting, race director]: f**k off! Honestly, f**k off!”
Immediately after the race Verstappen had five seconds added to his time for illegally gaining an advantage over Vettel, promoting the Ferrari to third and Ricciardo to fourth.
But troubled brewed while Vettel celebrated the delivery of natural justice from the podium.
“Seb did what everyone’s been complaining about lately – moving under braking,” Ricciardo said aggrievedly.
“I won the chess match, and then he’s like, ‘Oh, I’ve screwed up, now I’m going to try and repair my mistake’. For me that’s not right.”
Moving in the braking zone has been one of F1’s hot button issues in recent months after a number of borderline defensive manoeuvres executed by Verstappen raised the ire of many a senior driver, including Vettel, who was among the Dutchman’s most vocal critics.
The stewards took up the case and made the call. Vettel had ten seconds added to his race time, demoting him to fifth and promoting Ricciardo and Verstappen to third and fourth.
Maurizio Arrivabene, earlier the voice of reason on Vettel’s team radio when the German had lashed out at Whiting, was inconsolable.
“We gained a podium on the track and they removed it with their bureaucracy – fantastic,” he fumed.
But the third-to-fifth-placed drivers didn’t have a monopoly on controversy in Mexico City. Even second place-getter Nico Rosberg had an awkwardly timed barb to throw into the mix.
“How does he get away with that?” Rosberg cheekily exclaimed in his post-race interview with Sky Sports F1 while apparently watching a replay of Hamilton cutting the first turn – though he almost immediately refused to own his commentary. Ricciardo was on the same page.
“I didn’t understand the start – how you can be leading the race, defend, lock your wheels and go off track, and still stay in the lead,” he told Sky Sports F1.
“[Max] got a penalty, so I don’t know what was that different with his move and Lewis’.”
Hamilton of course received no reprimand for his first-lap excursion, and a safety car later that lap neutralised the debate.
Just as Vettel’s criticism of Max Verstappen helped trigger the FIA’s outlawing of braking-zone defending, so too did drivers playing fast and loose with track limits become an issue in the lead up to Mexico.
In this context Ecclestone somewhat disingenuously suggested building walls around the track edges, so frustratingly frequent were the drivers gaining advantages in the style Hamilton and Verstappen had done this weekend.
The cumulative effect is to reveal a grid of drivers and a broader sport in disarray over sporting standards. While some elder statesmen have proclaimed for months that gentlemen’s agreements on defensive driving have for years been sufficient, one has now been quick to throw the guidelines out of the cockpit in a fit of unedifying rage.
Likewise drivers who have long proclaimed a desire for hard and fair racing have been exposed, not unsurprisingly, as having little regard for rules as basic as those that dictate where the racing circuit starts and ends.
The result of it all is the embarrassing he-said-she-said finger pointing that unravelled at the end of the Mexican Grand Prix.
Though it may have provided some political titillation, what the dying moments of the Mexican Grand Prix really illustrated was just how unsporting Formula One’s sportsmen can be.
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marfu
Guest
Apology accepted Young Mark.
Mark Young
Roar Guru
I'm amazed at how infrequently it has occurred. When you run through the annals of the drivers who have been runner-up in the title and never won one themselves, you have incredible driving talents, but drivers who just got pipped by a better talent at the pointiest end of things. It also plays, as you identified, into the reality of number 1 and number 2 drivers. It will be remarkable if Rosberg, like the champions listed above, manages to extricate himself from Lewis's domination and win one for the Number 2s!
Mark Young
Roar Guru
Crap - Of course he did, sorry Marfu!
Michael Lamonato
Expert
I think settling issues on track — in the sense of coming together or similar — is probably not such a big thing amongst most of the current drivers, the key exception currently being Max Verstappen. We saw in Belgium, for example, deliberately over-aggressive driving when racing the Ferrari cars because he felt they dealt him an injustice at the first turn. That's not really how F1 conducts itself these days for obvious safety reasons, but who know? Maybe a new generation of drivers with no fear of modern machinery will bring it back. Oh man, I can hear the British press warming themselves up already... But yes, the reality is that the points don't lie. Rosberg can only race with what he's given, and like it or not he's done enough to put himself in a super-strong position. It's not his fault Hamilton's engine expired in Malaysia (he was also knocked down to the back of the grid in that race and had to recover, after all), so it'd be unfair to hold that against him. This is just sport, after all!
Michael Lamonato
Expert
I think it's probably a bit unfair to say Sainz beat him last year, though they were closely matched. Sainz suffered more unreliability, true, but he also wasn't as consistent. This year the story's different for Sainz, who has probably become the most promising driver without a drive at a championship-challenging team. As for comparisons with Ricciardo, while he is being beaten, their relative strengths will probably be more accurately detailed once Verstappen has a full off-season with the team. They're definitely pushing each other, though, and Verstappen has plenty of developing as a driver still to do. It'll be fascinating to look back on the battle in a decade to see what happens!
Michael Lamonato
Expert
Ah, very good! It's an interesting statistic. I suppose it plays to there usually being clear number one drivers in championship-winning teams, but it's hard to say! It'll be a good one to throw around if it does come to pass.
Michael Lamonato
Expert
Thanks for the comment, but the reality is quite the opposite — if you'd watched the race, you'd hear that Verstappen was told he should give the position back; it's only the full radio transcripts published later that we learnt RBR said they were willing to leave it up to the stewards investigation. Maybe that got lost in your intention to be deliberately incendiary. In any case the stewards did suggest to RBR that Verstappen ought to give the place back, but because in-race penalties can't be applied with three laps remaining in the race, the stewards couldn't take action until the race had ended.
marfu
Guest
Ah yes. They became WDC the year after their teammate was WDC. By the way. you didn't make it easy by stating that Hulme achieved it in 1968 when he actually did it in 1967.
Mark Young
Roar Guru
Yes! BUT look at who their teammate was in the year they won the title. And then look at their teammate the year before...... It is a very rare thing that Nico is about to pull off.....
Henk Dorpelaar
Guest
Red Bull ordered Verstappen to HOLD his position but that he might have to yield it because he was under investigation. Too bad the media is trying to push an entirely different narrative. Those who have actually seen the race know better.
marfu
Guest
They all finished second in the WDC the previous year?
Mark Young
Roar Guru
Finally, what people are forgetting about Max, is that he is being beaten by his teammates. Sainz Jnr was getting one over him sometimes, and Daniel is outdriving him right now. Do you recall all the times Jos Verstappen and Martin Brundle beat Schumacher? Or how Elio De Angelis used to beat Senna? No because they didn't!
Mark Young
Roar Guru
I was thinking of this the other day, most of the driving issues in F1 have been settled on the track. Think back to Senna, barging around and intimidating folk in the mid eighties. It was a long slow burn but ultimately, the coolest, calmest, Daddy in the sport, Alain Prost, drove into him and ending his 89 title run. It is coming for Max, It may not be this year, it may not be next year, but at some point, when he needs it least, a bloke, who may not even be in the sport yet, is going to slide under breaking in front of him and cause him all sort of dramas! I agree with you about Nico, if he can't jag a win in these next two races, the British press will never let him have legitimacy in the title. "The one Nico won when Mercedes let our Lewis down". Lewis has been below his best all season, off his game in numerous races and making a number of errors way below him. He deserves to be behind at this point. Ironically, If Lewis wins the next two races and Nico is off, there is nothing wrong with a Hamilton championship, but even if he does win both, and Nico just follows him home, then Nico will deserve it! Great place to be really.
Mark Young
Roar Guru
It is one for the Number 2 drivers!! Second Clue - Have a look at what happened to all these blokes the year before.......
Michael Lamonato
Expert
No argument on that one from me! I think there have been a fair few strategically interesting races this year that, similar to this, have just failed to fire in a way that would've made the spectacular but are nonetheless fascinating. Plus the off-track attitude this weekend was fun to watch!
Michael Lamonato
Expert
Thanks for the reply! I think the spectacle was great, and I'm more than happy to have the drama and the emotion of the fight broadcast to the world. For the record I don't dislike Vettel's whining — I think it reflects poorly on him, but it's great for the show — but what was obviously a step too far was bringing Charlie Whiting into it. Again, that's not just because it reflects badly on him, it's because Whiting isn't a play in the game and therefore isn't entitled to a reply. That's poor form. Likewise the way he defended against Ricciardo after being one of the louder voices in recent weeks decrying that same style when applied by Verstappen — a four-time world champion should be better than that. As for cutting the track, that's just basic racing rules, surely. I agree with you in that F1 needs that sort of villain — the driver every other driver hates racing against — but we lose out on wheel-to-wheel racing in this situation. As for Mercedes! I'm not sure Lewis and Nico are going to come together, though their reactions when one of them win/lose the title will be fascinating to watch. It really seems as though Hamilton has made peace with the situation after losing it completely in Japan, and Rosberg seems happy to cruise and collect (though I believe the legacy of his championship would be better served if he could win at least one of the next two...). What worries me is that Rosberg seems to keep leaving the door ajar at race starts and therefore remain open to attack from the RBRs and Ferraris, which is a recipe for a first-turn crash — as was almost the case with Verstappen this weekend. That's the real risk...
Michael Lamonato
Expert
I think Vettel's grown a lot since his RBR days. I also don't think he was shafted at all in Mexico — sort of the opposite. He was correctly penalised for his poor driving.
Michael Lamonato
Expert
But if he'd given the place back immediately, he'd have three laps to try to take it back — he didn't necessarily have to finish off the podium. Granted the pace difference due to tyres was weighted in Vettel's favour, but it still offered better odds. Yeah, Daniel is a pretty solid role model — even the way he conducted himself after Monaco, which was about as devastating as it comes, proved this. He's not self-absorbed, which means he's very good at looking at the bigger picture. He also makes great effort to articulate what he's feeling. I'll cut Vettel some slack, however, because almost without fail he'll revert to being more considered immediately after getting out of the car, admitting he was worked up by the adrenaline of the moment.
Brad
Guest
My understanding is that he has 3 laps to give it back once he is told to by race control. As they investigated it after the race since it was in the last 5 laps (standard practice) they decided after the race. Now this can only then be a time penalty which 5 second is more than he gained which is why normally the drivers just give the place back as that only looses 1-2 second. Now in his case it may not have been the most "sportsman" like move but his option was either give the place back or take a penalty which he chose take a penalty. I was a big vettel fan but am going off it with all the whining. Might as well call him Rossi if everything is just going to be someone else fault all the time. Maybe its just cause im an aussie but Dan let his feeling known in the post race interview but still conducted himself as professional since they get paid millions of dollars
Troy
Guest
Unsporting perhaps, but still one of the most interesting GPs of the year.