Bradley Scanes – Max Verstappen’s former fitness coach – revealed that in the 2021 F1 season, the Red Bull driver intentionally touched Lewis Hamilton’s rear wing, even though he knew he would be fined more than 50,000 euros.

The incident took place at Interlagos, Brazil. “Mad Max” (Verstappen’s nickname) collided with the rear wing of Hamilton’s car, then a Mercedes driver, in the parking area after qualifying. The Red Bull driver was later fined €50,000 for this action.

When appearing on the High Performance podcast, Scanes, who worked as Verstappen’s fitness coach from 2019 to 2023, revealed that Verstappen’s violation was a calculated act, aimed at putting pressure on Mercedes.

According to Scanes, this “wing contact” contributed to Mercedes changing the design of the rear wing, while also diverting public attention to the German team in the decisive phase. “Even if there was no technical impact, it was enough to create media pressure,” he said.

The 2021 season witnessed a thrilling battle between Hamilton and Verstappen. Before the final race in Abu Dhabi, the British driver won three races in a row. From 10th place, he rose to the top of the individual rankings, surpassing Vestappen.

The battle was not only on the track, but also heated behind the scenes. Scanes revealed that the atmosphere was so tense that the Red Bull and Mercedes members “didn’t even look at each other” when they met. “It was a real war,” he affirmed.

At the end of the season, Verstappen overtook Hamilton in the final round in Abu Dhabi, winning the 2021 individual championship. To this day, this season is still considered by many F1 fans to be the most exciting season of modern times.

Lewis Hamilton caught in ‘vicious’ F1 trap worsening Ferrari woes

One former F1 driver believes Lewis Hamilton’s Ferrari problems are being magnified by one crucial F1 factor.

Lewis Hamilton is being caught in the “vicious” F1 trap of an uber-close field in qualifying, magnifying his deficit to Charles Leclerc, one former driver believes.

Hamilton’s first year at Ferrari has not gone to plan thus far, with him being without a grand prix podium and firmly being outperformed by team-mate Leclerc.

Hamilton trails Leclerc 10-4 in qualifying with an average pace deficit of 0.241s based on each drivers outright fastest lap across the Saturday session, but the closeness of the field is making that gap wider than it seems.

Owing to the field converging, that near quarter-of-a-second gap is being filled by multiple drivers, meaning Hamilton is being shuffled out by the finest of margins whilst Leclerc fights through to the Q3 pole shootout.

After a torrid session in Hungary, Hamilton claimed he was “useless” and that Ferrari should look at signing “another driver” but former F1 racer Perry McCarthy believes Hamilton is simply being caught in the wrong place, at the wrong time and being caught out by how close the field actually is.

“The problem is that qualifying is so vicious this year as the field is so compact, so if you are just slightly off, then you’re going to miss Q3, and that is the big problem,” McCarthy told RacingNews365. 

“That’s caught out other highly talented and experienced drivers, including Charles, and it’s happened to Lewis a couple of times. It’s been a combination of him not getting the lap or making a mistake, as well as some elements from the team either putting him in traffic or out at the wrong time, and that’s caused consternation and friction.

“You’ve got to look at the character of Lewis, he’s 40 now but still has a competitive mindset and knows what he wants to bring to the party, so if something is a little bit off, he’s really unhappy, and especially unhappy if he feels it is him.

“But for all these people who make these horrible comments on Twitter about Lewis, if you are 0.2s off Charles Leclerc in qualifying, that 0.2s across a three-mile track, so he’s not exactly an old lady out there.”