Martin Brundle hits out at ‘churlish’ Max Verstappen FIA boycott situation

Time and a place, and a press conference is not the place says Martin Brundle

Max Verstappen’s tiff with the FIA over swearing during a press conference in Singapore has irked Martin Brundle, who called it “churlish all round”.

With the issue of drivers swearing becoming a talking point of late, FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem announced a clampdown on swearing in the build-up to the Singapore GP only for Verstappen to drop an F-bomb in the driver press conference.

Time and a place, and a press conference is not the place says Martin Brundle

Asked why Sergio Perez had been quicker than him at the previous race in Azerbaijan, Max Verstappen replied: “I don’t know. Different set-up. So as soon as I went into qualifying, I knew the car was f***ed.”

The Red Bull driver was found guilty of breaching Article 12.2.1k of the International Sporting Code for “Misconduct”, and was ordered to carry out “some work of public interest”.

He staged an almost-silent protest during his next appearance at an FIA press conference and barely spoke after qualifying before telling the assembled media that he’d speak with them “outside the room”.

Former F1 driver Brundle shared his thoughts on the subject with the Sky pundits not happy with anyone who was involved.

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“For me, it’s a storm in a teacup,” he told Sky F1. “Churlish all round, to be honest, and I don’t want to waste my heart beats too much talking about it too much.

“We’re all aligned on this, actually. I think the drivers should get together through the GPDA.

“They should think about, they represent themselves, they represent their families, their countries, they represent their amazing teams in the paddock, global sponsors, broadcasters, they know full well because they see them, they sign the caps, they see them in the fan zones, a lot of youngsters are following Formula 1, especially these days.

“I think they have a responsibility to control this swearing.

“Of course, in the heat of the moment, it happens, many of us swear like that, but gratuitous swearing, I don’t think is necessary, and it doesn’t look good for them.”

Asked by guest pundit Nico Rosberg if he had ever sworn himself, Brundle replied: “Well, thank you for asking, but I would never sit in a press conference and swear gratuitously like that. No, because I think you have to think about your audience.”

Rosberg agreed to a certain point, after all, the 2016 World Champion is the father of two young children.

“There’s two sides,” he admitted. “Now there’s my kids watching. On the other hand, we want them [the drivers] to be gladiators and show their emotions. So for me, the way is just bleep it out.

“Let them be, let them show their emotions. I think that’s important for all of us watching.

“If I was in Max’s position, though, this would not be so good, because he’s wasting his energy on this and he needs full focus. He’s fighting for the World Championship at the moment, so I think it’s not so great that he’s like dealing with it.”

As for Brundle’s suggestion that the drivers deal with the swearing ban through the Grand Prix Drivers’ Association, Verstappen revealed he has done just that.

“Yeah, for sure. Of course, I wrote in the GPDA [chat] the ruling, and everyone was almost laughing like, ‘what the hell is that’ basically. So, yeah, it is very, very silly,” he said.

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