Lewis Hamilton brutal F1 relationship revealed: 'It was war!'

Nico Rosberg has shed an astonishing spotlight on his relationship with Lewis Hamilton during their time together as Mercedes team-mates, describing it as all-out war.

When Hamilton replaced Michael Schumacher at Mercedes and joined forces with Rosberg, it appeared to be the rekindling of a friendship going back to their days in karting when they were best pals.

Once Mercedes started to dominate F1 in 2014 following the introduction of a new power unit, however, and victories became the norm, leading to a fight for the F1 drivers' title, their friendship rapidly deteriorated.

Hamilton won his second and third titles in 2014 and 2015 before Rosberg fought back the following year, with their relationship exploding when they crashed into one another on the opening lap of the Spanish Grand Prix.

Rosberg went on to clinch what proved to be his only title at the end of a bitterly fractious season, at which point he immediately retired.

Reflecting on the nadir of his time with Hamilton, speaking on the High Performance podcast, Rosberg said: "There was no relationship. It's proper war. It's like war. No relationship. Don't talk. War!"

Although pointed out to Rosberg that he and Hamilton had been "great buddies", the German driver made clear that there is a dividing line.

"Yes, but when you fight for a world championship, you will always compromise the friendship for getting the world championship, unfortunately.

"It's such a big dream that you'll just.. if you choose, you will choose the world championship over that friendship. It's not like we were best friends at the time, anyway.

"We were best friends when we were kids, but then we kind of drifted apart during our careers. We got on well, but we were not best friends anymore.

"And then between getting on well or winning a world championship, you'll choose winning the world championship. And to win a world championship, you need to exploit the grey areas all the time.

"In wheel-to-wheel races you cannot just be the nice guy. You need to push into the grey area, hold your ground, because the other guy's going to do it too, so you've got to go there."

Pressed on the fact that in a paddock environment over a grand prix weekend they would be "almost living together", he replied: "As you can imagine, it was maybe not the most comfortable environment", insisting again that there was "no talk".