Adrian Newey has shared his personal theory that Mercedes “psychologically” could not let Abu Dhabi 2021 go, which began to “affect their psyche”.
Red Bull’s Max Verstappen and Mercedes‘ Lewis Hamilton went into their F1 2021 Abu Dhabi World Championship decider level on points, with Hamilton seemingly on course for a record-breaking eighth World Championship crown before a late Safety Car turned the situation on its head.
Adrian Newey: Abu Dhabi 2021 ‘got to’ Mercedes
With then race director Michael Masi clearing only the lapped cars between Hamilton and Verstappen for the restart, Verstappen, who had pitted for fresh tyres, passed Hamilton on the final lap and raced on to his first World Championship crown.
And during an appearance on the High Performance podcast, Red Bull’s soon-to-be-former F1 design guru Newey was asked how Verstappen dealt with what happened in Abu Dhabi, as it was put to him that Red Bull were unfairly blamed for what was a controversial action from the race director.
“I think, honestly, Max is so self-assured, and this is in a positive way, it’s not in a negative way, you know, there’s arrogance and there’s self-assured. And Max is not arrogant, but he is very self-assured and self-confident,” said Newey.
“And he’s a deep thinker, but he doesn’t let things like that… I think they don’t really get to him. He’s able to shut that off and just get on with his job and get on with his task and do what he loves doing, which is driving racing cars.”
Asked if Abu Dhabi 2021 got to him, Newey said “it didn’t”, but while he could be “completely wrong” in saying this, he felt Mercedes were holding on “psychologically” to this controversy to their own detriment.
Max Verstappen v Lewis Hamilton rivalry in quotes pre-Abu Dhabi 2021
“I mean, actually, I think it got to Mercedes and, instead of saying, okay, well, accepting it and moving on, it started to affect their psyche, which is an interesting one,” Newey claimed.
“That’s from the outside, and I might be completely wrong. Just they couldn’t let it go. Psychologically, they couldn’t let it go.
“And you have to… We all have a bad race, perhaps should have won and the bloody thing broke down on the last lap or whatever. And I always have a personal issue like that, actually, I will be horrible to be around in the airport and that Sunday evening, but come Monday morning, I’ve got to wake up and be back on it.
“I can’t go back into the factory all miserable and downbeat. Part of my position, I suppose, is to help, to try to hopefully motivate everybody, not just saying: ‘Oh, it’s so unfair and we were robbed’ and all that. It doesn’t help does it?”
Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff recently gave a fresh address of the Abu Dhabi 2021 saga, with Hamilton set to leave Mercedes at the end of F1 2024 to head for Ferrari.
While maintaining that Abu Dhabi 2021 was an injustice, Wolff is keen to move on and look at the bigger picture.
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