Driver backlash against ‘unnecessary and poorly chosen’ F1 team radio

F1 drivers have united in criticising the use of some team radio exchanges that are chosen for broadcast.

Fernando Alonso aimed a cheeky swipe at F1 following the Singapore Grand Prix, where he made headlines for his team radio messages.

The two-time world champion launched into an extraordinary post-race radio rant when he was beaten to seventh place by four tenths of a second by Lewis Hamilton, who was nursing an ailing Ferrari.

"F***ing hell mate, I cannot believe it,” Alonso shouted. “I cannot f***ing believe it, I cannot f***ing believe it. I mean I cannot f***ing believe it. I cannot f***ing believe it. Is it safe to drive with no brakes?”

Alonso was ultimately promoted to P7 after Hamilton was handed a five-second time penalty for excessive track limits as a result of a late brake issue.

The 44-year-old Spaniard entertained over the airwaves throughout the race in Singapore, telling his race engineer at one point: “If you speak to me every lap, I will disconnect the radio.”

However, Alonso feels the team radio that F1 broadcasts is often “unnecessary and poorly chosen”.

"Unnecessary sometimes, poorly broadcast and chosen by the one choosing which radios to broadcast,” he said ahead of the United States Grand Prix.

"Misunderstood 99.9% of the time because they are private conversations with your engineer or your team that maybe you went through on Sunday morning at the strategy meeting.

“What happens if we come out of the pitstop with this scenario or what happens if lap one, we overtake two cars or lose two positions or whatever. So you have alternative plans on the strategy.

"When you only broadcast only one sentence, it's impossible to understand from home the repercussions it has. Sometimes, when the radio broadcast is the protagonist of the race that also is very sad that the race was so poor in terms of entertainment.

"So that's something we need to improve, all as a group in the sport.”

Fernando Alonso supported by fellow drivers

Alonso was supported in his view by Haas rookie Oliver Bearman, who pointed to other sports where athletes are not mic’d up in the heat of the moment.

"I don't think it's ideal,” Bearman said. "It's the age-old thing, I think if a footballer or other sportsman had a mic on, and were broadcast, the view would be very different. It's tough.

"We can not open the microphone and say it in our head but with the amount of adrenaline and pressure we're under in this sport, when you open the radio and you want to share your frustration or your feelings with your engineer, you're not thinking about the other people and the whole population of the world that could potentially hear it.

"It's a shame it's broadcast; for me, it should be cracked down a little bit.”

Meanwhile, Alpine’s Franco Colapinto said: “It's a sport that has very different things compared to other sports. Two minutes before we jump in the car, we are with fans, with people. We're not fully focused on what we have to do.

"Any other sports, tennis, football, any other sport, they are fully focused with their team, two hours before, they don't see anyone. They're fully focused on what they have to do next [but] we have many things, external stuff that we have today, the radio is one of them.

"To get the chance…for it to be open to all the world, everyone being able to listen to what we say, sometimes it's tough."