Sky Sports F1's Rachel Brookes on an unforgettable weekend in Barcelona - and what it was like to be the first reporter to interview Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg after their race-ending collision...
Thursday 19 May 2016 11:21, UK
Spoiler alert: Stop reading if you're not up to date on Game of Thrones!
It seems a long time ago now but the Spanish GP began with a sunny Thursday afternoon in Barcelona when the world's media gathered to hear from the six drivers in the FIA press conference in a small press conference room on the first floor of the main building at the Circuit de Catalunya.
Front and centre was Daniil Kvyat. Demoted from Red Bull racing to Toro Rosso. On his left, the man he had swapped with: 18-year-old Max Verstappen.
The room was packed. I would say there was standing room only, but even all the standing room had been taken up. Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso, themselves all-too familiar with being the centre of attention, were relegated to the back row and sat chatting and laughing like naughty schoolboys in class.
As the questions came, I thought Daniil handled himself brilliantly and even at one point got a round of applause from the room. He told us how he got the call from Helmut Marko telling him of the swap while lying on the sofa in Moscow watching Game of Thrones and after being told of his dispatch to a 'Castle Black' of his own, resumed his viewing.
Max was calm and collected, but he always has been since I first spoke to him in the paddock in Spa less than a year ago. He has incredible confidence and more than held his own in a very tense atmosphere, only broken up by Fernando's feigned surprise at the driver swap news!
Afterwards they all went to the media pen and it was then that Dani's day got worse. Asked which Game of Thrones character he would be he replied ,"a good guy". So he was asked 'like Jon Snow?' He said yes. Then the interviewer replied, 'nice parallel there, second chance, back from the dead?' To which a confused Dani replied "wait, what?!"
He was still on a much earlier series...
Qualifying on Saturday felt like a turning point in the season. Max put in an incredible performance and almost beat Daniel Ricciardo while Lewis Hamilton was, in the words of Nico Rosberg, "just better today". Ferrari were left scratching their heads as changes to the cars set up hadn't given the expected result and their drivers were left back on the third row on a weekend where their boss Sergio Marchionne had said he expected them to start winning.
Just before the race I was in the pitlane for the toilet run interviews and I noticed Lewis come back in after an installation lap and be reversed back into the garage. I asked Toto if there were any issues and he said 'no', before adding: "But you can't talk to a driver on the grid anymore".
With the new radio rules if drivers have a query on that lap out to the grid, the only way to ask it is back in the garage - so Lewis had returned to speak to his engineers before going back out to the grid again.
The drivers use the harvest mode on the lap to the grid but once there they change it to the start mode. They used to be able to be reminded to do this by their engineers but now they have to do it themselves. If the rules had not changed, Nico's team would have been able to tell him on the grid that he was in the wrong mode for the start...
And so to the race. I made my way to the Williams motorhome for the race start as it shows our channel and was hoping to grab a quick drink while watching the race start and making any notes. Simon and the guys came in shortly after at which point he asked Marc Priestley who was going to win. "Merc boys will take each other out and Verstappen goes on to win," Marc said. Moments later a huge cheer went up in various motorhomes up and down the paddock and you can guess why.
I made my way to the interview pen to wait for the drivers. They had gone into the Mercedes 'treehouse' and the world's media rushed to stand outside and wait for any sign of personnel.
Then Ant joined me in the pen to go on air and say what he had seen from Nico's onboard camera. He had noticed that Nico was fiddling with something on the steering wheel just before he moved across to defend. Further analysis would show that he was in the wrong mode and was adjusting it out of Turn Three.
By the time Lewis and Nico came to the interview pen, I knew the stewards had ruled it a racing incident. At moments like this, unless you have heard the driver give another interview already, you have no idea what mood they will be in. Lewis approached looking calm and I asked him what happened. He gave his response and while apologising to all those who had worked so hard for nothing, he did not lay blame at anyone's door.
We then waited for Nico to come to the pen and I was expecting him to be in a similar mood. It was almost four hours after the incident and clearly the team had spoken to both drivers about their responsibilities and about what had happened. He came over to start the interview before stepping away and having a word with his manager in German. He then came back to me but already from that brief conversation I could see Nico was agitated. I usually only get a maximum of three questions with each driver, so having seen his mood and seen the on-air footage of exactly what was happening in his car, I needed to find out 1) if he was distracted, 2) if he agreed with the stewards, and 3) if he blamed Lewis.
So, I asked him to talk us through it from his point of view and that I understood he had been in the wrong mode and had he maybe been distracted momentarily out of Turn Three? Nico replied that he wasn't distracted at all. "I was aware of the situation and saw Lewis coming closer, so I went for the usual racing driver action of closing the inside line and closing the door as early as I could," he said. "I made it very clear I wasn't going to leave any space on the inside and I was very surprised he went for the gap anyway."
While Nico said he accepted the stewards' decision, he never once said he agreed with it.
Social media was alive with comment, and abuse, after the race and after hearing from both drivers opinion was very much divided. Anthony had showed in great detail exactly what happened and what was going on while others tried to apportion blame. The facts, however, seem straightforward. It was a good start for Nico and clever use of slipstreaming that helped him make a great move around the outside to get into the lead. Lewis, having seen his team-mate overtake him, saw the rain light on and that he was gaining with a 17kph advantage and chose his moment to try to overtake. Had Nico not been in harvesting mode he would have been clean away at that point. Drivers past and present have commented, some saying there was no way Nico could not have been distracted by what he was doing, others saying Lewis was too aggressive.
As Lewis' hero Ayrton Senna once said " If you no longer go for a gap that exists, you are no longer a racing driver", but others argue that there were 65 more laps in which to find that gap.
The last time the two Mercedes drivers made contact on track, Lewis went on to win six of the next seven races. With a 43-point advantage going to Monaco, Nico needs to make sure Lewis doesn't have a Jon Snow moment of his own.
Even in the airport lounge while waiting for the flight home the debate raged on, while in a corner of the Red Bull motorhome an 18 year old stared incredulously at the winner's trophy.....
