The taunts that lit up social media were the final straw for the bleary-eyed mechanics who had endured a sleepless night to get Lewis Hamilton on track for the Russian Grand Prix.
Toto Wolff, the head of Mercedes Motorsport, was enraged by the casual cruelty of the “lunatic” Twitter typists dishing out their accusations from the sanctuary of their bedrooms even as his team moved heaven and earth to rescue a desperate day for the world champion.
“The Twittersphere was already at boiling point even before Hamilton’s Mercedes sprung its leak and he had to back off
Hamilton finished the Russian Grand Prix yesterday in second place to Nico Rosberg, his Mercedes team-mate. Yet the stories of their weekend — and their season — could not be in starker contrast.
Rosberg leads Hamilton by 43 points in this world championship after four consecutive victories. That elevates Rosberg to an exclusive club of drivers — with Nigel Mansell, Michael Schumacher and Ayrton Senna — who have won the first four races of the season.
Yet Rosberg has barely seen another car. He has raced, if that is the correct description, for 224 laps without overtaking a soul, or even being approached. He was 25sec ahead of Hamilton at the chequered flag yesterday, enough to take in the lovely weather and the sea air of Sochi. Rosberg admitted that he put in his fastest lap almost at the finish simply to maintain his concentration. Such luxury.
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Cue the laptop loonies: Hamilton, of course, was hit by an energy recovery system failure in China and here there was a repeat in qualifying that meant he had to start from tenth on the grid. Even after taking advantage of the first lap carnage that removed Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel, a potential threat to his progress, from the grand prix, Hamilton’s pursuit of his team-mate for victory was then scuppered by a water pressure fault.
The Twittersphere was already at boiling point even before Hamilton’s Mercedes sprung its leak and he had to back off.
To accuse Mercedes of sabotaging Hamilton’s grand prix yesterday is, as Wolff says, lunacy beyond comprehension. This is a team who have given Hamilton one of the greatest cars in the history of Formula One and a path to two consecutive world championships, not to mention a welter of pole positions and victories. But the evidence is damning, apparently: after all, five of Hamilton’s 15-strong garage team worked for Rosberg last season, so that proves the conspiracy, doesn’t it?
And so the knives are out for Wolff, his executives and the exhausted engineers and mechanics who started work at 2am yesterday to prepare Hamilton’s car after an extraordinary mission that started in the factory at their headquarters in Brackley, Northamptonshire, and ended with a private plane dashing to Russia with a box load of crucial components. “We are working our a**** off to give Lewis the best car,” Wolff said with a hint of an angry tremor in his voice. “It is difficult to take people out there seriously when they are lying in their beds with their laptops on their chests sending those abusive messages out. You wonder what goes through their minds.
“I am being vocal about it because [the engineers] are being hit by comments that are unfair and outright abusive without reason. Some of the guys might read those comments and take it personally.” Those abusive online hecklers should know this: as soon as Hamilton’s car developed its problem in qualifying, Paddy Lowe, the Mercedes technical director, called the factory to order components that might be needed. Niki Lauda, the chairman with wide connections in the airline business, got to work finding a plane, while Nicole Bearne, Lowe’s assistant, who speaks fluent Russian, started arranging customs clearance.
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Here in Sochi, Bernie Ecclestone, F1’s chief executive, pulled strings with diplomats close to President Vladimir Putin to ensure the smooth passage of the crucial box that was off the plane within seconds of landing at a dark Sochi airport and rushed to the Mercedes garage.
And so Hamilton was able to race to salvage something from what has been an extraordinarily bumpy season so far. The determined demeanour of the past few weeks had softened last night into a mild depression. There was no champagne spraying on the podium as Hamilton slunk away to lick his wounds.
“I don’t sit here all happy because nothing has gone particularly well,” he said. “I fought hard and got myself back up there and, ultimately, I wasn’t able to race for the win. I am really proud of my guys. They are having a hard time at the moment. I imagine they are feeling the pressure but it’s nothing to do with them. They are doing a fantastic job and there is no reason we can’t win, it is just that we have these bugs coming along.”
He repeated his mantra: we win and lose together. It is just harder when losing is so far beyond your control and your team-mate is enjoying a holiday cruise to the biggest title in motor racing. But it is not for the want of trying — by Hamilton and the engineers and mechanics, who deserve the highest praise, not the foul accusations of deluded social media addicts.
Driven to succeed
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Only four drivers have won the first four races of a season — Nico Rosberg (2016), Nigel Mansell (1992), Michael Schumacher (1994, 2004) and Ayrton Senna (1991)
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Only four drivers have recorded seven consecutive wins or more — Sebastian Vettel (nine in 2013), Rosberg (seven in 2015-16), Schumacher (2004) and Alberto Ascari (1952-53)
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Nico Rosberg, with one winning streak of seven, has recorded more wins than the five career wins recorded by Keke, his father and 1982 world champion.