Martin Brundle suspects that there may still be "needle" between former McLaren teammates Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton. Hamilton found himself unable to get past the Alpine of Alonso for a significant proportion of the Monaco Grand Prix, with Alonso working to preserve his tyres. This led to some frustration for Hamilton, who eventually finished the race in P8, four seconds back from Alonso in seventh.
Still tensions between Alonso and Hamilton?
Alonso and Hamilton had a famously tumultous year driving alongside each other at McLaren in 2007, which ended when Alonso left the team at the end of the season. This may have happened a long time ago, but Brundle has questioned whether events in Monte Carlo were a sign of lingering tensions between the two. "Fernando Alonso went into a steady, but necessary for him, tyre preservation mode, with the rest of the field queued up behind him, starting with a very frustrated Lewis Hamilton," Brundle wrote in his column for Sky Sports . "'That's not my problem' said Fernando, and you can't help but sense there's still needle between them after their McLaren season as teammates back in 2007. "Fernando then bizarrely took off for a while and did the third fastest lap of the race to retain seventh place." Brundle also noted that the two drivers were amongst the former World Champions to have had a challenging day in Monaco. "Eighth was Hamilton, who would normally have excelled in such conditions given some clear air, and 10th was Sebastian Vettel for Aston Martin, meaning that, along with Alonso, just seven seconds covered drivers with a combined 13 World Championships... but not much glory on this day," he added.
Praise for Hamilton's teammate Russell
Elsewhere, Hamilton's Mercedes teammate, George Russell, took the 'best of the rest' result of P5, with Lando Norris not far behind in the McLaren. Brundle was impressed with Russell's performance, which continues the Briton's trend of finishing in the top five at every Grand Prix of the year so far. "George Russell put in yet another fine drive for Mercedes to take fifth," the former F1 driver said. "He ended up just two tenths ahead of McLaren's Lando Norris, who also achieved fastest lap on his fresh Medium tyres, fitted on Lap 51 of what became a shortened and timed-out 64 lap race (instead of the scheduled 78) in a curious elapsed time of one hour and fifty six and a half minutes of racing."
Most read
