Like ten years ago
The start of this 2026 season, with Andrea Kimi Antonelli and George Russell sharing victories, podiums, and the top two positions in the championship, giving the idea of being able to reduce the race for the world title to an all-internal derby in the Mercedes garage, moves the F1 clock back a decade. In 2016 in fact, there was perhaps the peak of the Brackley team’s dominance in those early years of the hybrid era with Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg winning 19 out of 21 races. In the collective memory, however, the memory is linked above all to the first of the two races that slipped through their fingers: the infamous Spanish GP in which the two Mercedes standard-bearers threw each other off the track during the first lap, certifying on world television a rivalry that had by then transcended the boundaries of simple sporting competition and had clearly become a personal matter.
Read more Zak Brown celebrates Lambiase and locks down Stella: “They will work together”
The title was eventually won by Nico Rosberg, who then, exhausted by the clash with his English rival, decided to retire, thus allowing team principal Toto Wolff to hire Valtteri Bottas and significantly ease the tension within the team. Rosberg and Hamilton also clashed that season in the Austrian GP, this time during the last lap, with Hamilton winning that race and Rosberg instead falling from first to fourth. In a long and interesting interview given to the site The Athletic, Wolff himself recalled that season and, speaking of one of the clashes that occurred between his two drivers, revealed that in an attempt to restore order within a team in total turmoil, he had gone as far as firing both drivers who were dominating the championship.
Toto’s iron fist
“In 2016, (Nico) Rosberg and (Lewis) Hamilton collided a first time and then again. So I fired them – Wolff recounted – I called my CEO, Dieter Zetsche, at Mercedes, and told him: “Listen, you have to sign something”. He called me back saying: “You’re firing both drivers”. And I replied: “Yes, because otherwise they will never understand how important it is to put the interest of the brand and the team before their own.” Their personal rivalry had taken over. From healthy competition, it turned into rivalry and then into animosity. And that is something I would never allow within the organization. Based on these elements, we sent them an email saying: “At the moment, you are not part of the team”.
Read more Lambiase’s exit reopens the doors of Red Bull to Wheatley?
On Wednesday we called them and said: “Come tomorrow”, and I added: “My problem is that I don’t know whose fault it is.” Because it’s a complex issue. As in everything in life, there is never 100% blame. It could be 50-50. It could be 51-49. It could be 70-30. And I can’t judge. So what I told them was that if it happened again, one of the two would have to leave and I could be wrong. I could have sent away the wrong person.
What should the people who have to pay the mortgage and who work in the factory think? That you two collide because you don’t like each other? And that this directly affects the lives of two thousand five hundred people. Who do you think you are? And this is an important awareness that drivers must have.“ Russell and Antonelli, today’s two ‘roosters in the henhouse’, are warned.
Read more AF Corse 499P unveiled with a new sponsor – GALLERY
