Sky Sports F1 presenter Rachel Brookes has opened up on ‘vile abuse’ she received in the aftermath of the Spanish Grand Prix weekend.
Max Verstappen adopted a fiery attitude with the broadcaster after he had appeared to intentionally crash into Mercedes’ George Russell, who also was tense in his post-race interview when trying to condemn Verstappen’s actions.
On top of this, Lewis Hamilton appeared rather downbeat when talking about his ‘terrible’ day in Spain, even saying to Brookes that he ‘doesn’t know what else to say’.
Hamilton later apologised to Brookes for acting that way in his interview, as revealed by David Croft on the F1 Show.
Verstappen’s move on Russell landed him a 10-second time penalty, which demoted him down to 10th in the final classification, but it has been hotly debated since then.
Online abuse towards F1 paddock personnel is seemingly getting worse, with Channel 4’s Lee McKenzie recently opening up on abuse she has suffered.
On top of this, drivers Yuki Tsunoda, Jack Doohan and Franco Colapinto were all subject to awful abuse during the Imola GP weekend, leading FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem to release an official statement on the matter.