29 September 2022
Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton were childhood friends and had a great relationship as they climbed through the motorsport ranks to make it to Formula One.
They became teammates at Mercedes in 2013.
Mercedes had the best car when F1’s turbo-hybrid era began in 2014.
But things quickly turned sour when a world title was on the line—Mercedes putting combat rules and sanctions in place to control their drivers.
At the final race of the 2016 season in Abu Dhabi, Hamilton ignored team orders by trying to back Rosberg up into the pack to put cars between them to win the title.
Rosberg prevailed to become world champion and retired from F1 just five days later, having achieved his dream.
The first Extreme E Season in 2021 saw Hamilton’s Team X44 tie on points with Nico Rosberg’s X Racing; eventually, X Racing won due to having more victories.
What is fascinating is that neither Lewis nor Nico knew about the other’s plans and was building a racing team simultaneously.
And now? Whilst Lewis and Nico do not have a close relationship as they did during their younger days, I understand mutual respect between the two remains.
