Lewis Hamilton, Max Verstappen jibes force Nico Rosberg climbdown

Nico Rosberg

Hamilton, Verstappen jibes force Rosberg climbdown

'I'm going to try and change my tone a little bit now.'

Matthew Scott

Sunday 8 September 2019 11:06

Nico Rosberg says he will change the tone of his YouTube assessments of Formula 1's star drivers after both Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen were critical of him at the Italian Grand Prix.

In recent weeks, Rosberg has used his vlog to suggest that Hamilton's age might be hindering his qualifying efforts and criticise Verstappen's performance in Belgium, where the Red Bull man crashed out on lap one.

Verstappen compared Rosberg to Jacques Villeneuve, another outspoken former world champion, something Hamilton applauded on Instagram, having read his racing rival's thoughts on GPFans.

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Asked about his post after qualifying in Monza, Hamilton said: "I thought it was really funny – I think Max is generally a really funny guy so I was cracking up when I saw it.

"When in the sport, [drivers] moan about being criticised by people from the outside and then when drivers retire they become those critics, so it's an interesting dynamic.

"Unfortunately drivers become irrelevant when they retire and ultimately have to hang on to utilise other people's light to keep them in the light. But that's the way of sport, I guess."

Before offering his subscribers analysis of the chaotic scenes in Monza qualifying, Rosberg explained that the comments had gotten to him.

"When I was still active, one of the things I hated most was journalists telling me about comments ex-drivers made about me which came across in a critical way, in particular in my case it was often David Coulthard, which would drive me nuts. It was horrible.

"Lewis even Instagram storied about me, Max also said something, firing back at me or whatever, but especially Lewis, if he Insta storied about me, you can imagine that I must have annoyed him pretty much.

View this post on Instagram

"This has me in stitches" says @lewishamilton 👀👀👀

A post shared by GPFans Global (@gpfansglobal) on Sep 7, 2019 at 3:40am PDT

"I love doing these analyses because I love discussing my sport and trying to give great insight, but at the same time I have great respect for the drivers.

"So I need to make a little bit of a change because I don't want my ex-colleagues, who I respect a lot – Max and Lewis and everybody else – to get relayed some comments about me which come across very critically to them.

"So I'm going to try and change my tone a little bit now."