Lewis Hamilton has condemned offensive comments made by the Red Bull motorsport adviser Helmut Marko about Sergio Pérez and insisted that, despite his subsequent apology, they were completely unacceptable.
As Formula One prepares for this weekend’s Singapore Grand Prix, Red Bull’s Max Verstappen also took a swipe at Hamilton’s Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff, demanding that he focus on his task rather than demeaning their rivals’ success.
Marko caused considerable offence when he made comments about the team’s Mexican driver, who has been underperforming this season. “Let’s remember that he is South American and so he is not as focused as Max Verstappen or Sebastian Vettel was,” he said of Pérez.
The Red Bull adviser has since apologised publicly and privately to the 33-year-old, acknowledging the remark was offensive. But Hamilton, who has worked to combat discrimination in F1, was unequivocal that it was not good enough from such a senior figure.
“It is completely unacceptable. This is not something you just apologise for and it is all OK,” he said. “Whilst we say there is no room for any type of discrimination in this sport and there should be no room for it, to have leaders and people in his position making comments like this is not good for us moving forward.
“There are a lot of people in the background that really are combating these kind of things, but it is hard to manoeuvre if people at the top have mindsets which stop us from progressing. But it is not my team and not how we move as a team. We still have a lot of work to do to make this a more inclusive environment.”
Speaking before this weekend’s meeting at the Marina Bay circuit, Pérez’s teammate Verstappen was dismissive of comments made by Wolff after the Dutch driver took a record 10th consecutive win at the last round in Monza.
Wolff had dismissed the achievement as “irrelevant” in the aftermath of the race where his drivers had finished fifth and sixth and Verstappen was blunt in his response.
“Mercedes had a pretty shit race, so he was probably still pissed off with their performance,” he said. “He almost sounds like he’s an employee of our team but luckily he is not. It’s just important that you focus on your own team, that’s what we did in the past when they were dominating. It worked as a kind of inspiration.
“You should be able to appreciate when a team is doing really well. To see someone that dominant, we knew that we just had to work harder and try to get to that level.”
Verstappen goes into the meeting leading Pérez by 145 points and could claim the title at the next round in Japan.
