Former F1 driver and current Sky Sports commentator and presenter Martin Brundle has opened up about his experiences during the controversial 2021 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. He stated that it was his “most unpleasant time” in all his years with Sky Sports.
The 2021 F1 season was characterized by an intense title competition between Red Bull’s Max Verstappen and Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton. Tensions peaked during the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. Hamilton seemed poised to win his record-breaking eighth championship when a Safety Car was deployed late in the race due to an incident involving Nicholas Latifi.
The race director at the time Michael Masi decided to allow only some lapped cars to unlap themselves in order to avoid ending the race under safety car conditions, which led to widespread criticism. This meant Verstappen could close the gap to Hamilton, ultimately overtaking him to win the championship. Many viewed this as an unprecedented and contentious decision, which deviated from the usual Safety Car protocols.
The intense rivalry between Mercedes and Red Bull wasn’t limited to the racetrack. Both teams frequently engaged in public disputes, turning media platforms into battlefields where commentators often found themselves entangled. Martin Brundle reflected on this tense time, explaining how he and his colleagues at Sky Sports found themselves “caught in the crossfire” of this ongoing saga.
During an appearance on the Sky Sports F1 podcast, Brundle explained:
“So, we are in a sanctum. We get caught in the crossfire. The most unpleasant time I’ve known in all these years of commentating was Abu Dhabi 2021, and 2021 in general, because it became so feisty, so aggressive between Mercedes and Red Bull and Sky kind of got caught up in the middle of that.
“We got caught in the crossfire, basically. And each team pretty much felt if you weren’t with them, you had to be against them. And they both felt that. And it was really uncomfortable, actually, that whole phase.
“But friendships remained, and we all moved on.”
Brundle also shared insights into the methods he and fellow commentator David Croft employ to gather information from teams. On Sunday mornings, they attend briefings to acquire last-minute insights. He added:
“Sunday morning we go to some briefings, Crofty, and I, and get that sort of last-minute knowledge.
“And teams are quite open at that point. They’re not going to give you their race strategy, but they give you a lot of information.
“We just read all weekend. I go out on track on a Friday, so I get a lot of knowledge from that. I talk relentlessly to people. I’ve got my touchstones in the paddock where we trade information, three or four people.
“If something big is going up, I will go and talk to Zak, Christian, Toto, go and talk to somebody. And they won’t tell me lies. If they can’t tell me, they won’t tell me, or they’ll tell me something. I would say 60 or 70 per cent of what I know I can never say on the TV, but that does give me the other 30 per cent, and then it also means that it gives me a guidance, or I can give my Sky F1 colleagues guidance on if we’re heading off in the wrong direction or something.
“It’s probably too much, 60, 70 per cent, but there’s a lot of stuff you get to know, and people tell you in great confidence. So you can’t breach that confidence, otherwise you’ll never get the other bit down the road.”
