Battle of the teammates or Why did the FIA intervene in the battle between Hamilton and Russell?

Sunday’s Miami Grand Prix was indeed full of fierce battles in the middle of the field, one of them being the one on lap 50 between Lewis Hamilton and George Russell. The FIA itself had to intervene in the duel between the two teammates for one main reason.

It’s the 50th round of the Miami Grand Prix and the pair of teammates are locked in a very attractive battle for fifth place.

Everything important happened at Turns 11 and 12 when Russell got ahead of Hamilton for that fifth place. However, it was Russell who helped himself to gain the position by going off track with all four laps at one point.

It should be noted, while Hamilton had already worn out a set of the hardest tyres, Russell took advantage of the safety car exit due to the mutual contact between Norris and Gasly and changed to the medium hardness tyres marked yellow.

Logically, the 24-year-old British driver was clearly the faster driver at that point. However, the FIA branded Russell’s actions as a breach of the rules and ordered Mercedes to swap the drivers’ positions to their original order.

So Russell later slowed down to let Hamilton back in front of him. He then passed him again, but within the rules, and Russell finished the Miami Grand Prix in fifth.

Valtteri Bottas also added spice to the battle, also joining the battle for fifth. However, the former Mercedes driver hit the wall in his attempt to pass both drivers at once and remained in seventh place.

“It’s clear that when you’re battling with your teammate, you have to give him a bit more room than you normally would. Turn 11 in particular is one where you can’t tell where the edge of the track is because there’s only a white line,” Russell explained his battle with Hamilton in an interview with RaceFans.

“When they told me we had to swap positions, it was a bit frustrating because at one point I was catching up with the riders in front of me. But luckily we all made it to the finish line safely,” he added.

In addition to the fact that in this case it was also an overrun of the track limits, the FIA considers such actions dangerous. However, Russell did not receive any additional penalty.

In addition, since this season the FIA has banned direct communication between the team boss and the race director. Mercedes boss Toto Wolff then went on to explain that there was no communication involved in this case. Mercedes had simply been told by the directorate what to do.

“There was no dialogue with the FIA and I think this is the right set-up. It was that we were instructed by the FIA to change positions on the track,” Wolff explained to RaceFans.

F1, RaceFans