Lewis Hamilton and F1 rivals have ‘out of control’ WhatsApp group with one driver the leader
LEWIS HAMILTON and his Formula 1 rivals have an “out of control” WhatsApp group chat.
When not fighting tooth and nail around a circuit, F1 drivers share messages with each other via WhatsApp.
The existence of the group chat came to light last year, when Nikita Mazepin revealed he’d been booted out of it on the same day as his Haas axing.
Hamilton’s Mercedes team-mate George Russell is a chat admin, and lifted the lid on what goes on while appearing on The Fast and the Curious podcast.
He said: “There is a WhatsApp group.
“I mean it’s not like we’re sending banter in there day after day but there are occasions where something may have happened on track and suddenly people are sending memes in and whatever and it gets a bit out of control.”
McLaren star Lando Norris then revealed what the group chat icon is.
Giggling, he said: “James Hunt as the group photo.”
He then revealed: “It’s true [the group exists].
“It’s not so much like ‘hey, we’re all mates’. It’s a lot more for talking about things that can help us as drivers in terms of rules, regulations, it’s more like how can we represent ourselves?
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“I don’t know how much [George] revealed, he’s like the head of it.”
Norris, 23, then went on: “It’s a little bit of everyone.
“We are all kind of chatting and working together to come up with different ideas.
“We’ve got Esteban [Ocon], we got Zhou [Guanyu], we’ve got Alex [Albon]. Everyone chats in it [but] I can’t find any memes.”
All members of the Grand Prix Drivers Association [GPDA] are part of the chat.
Sebastian Vettel, who retired at the end of last season, played a key role.
While Hamilton has been a member of the GPDA since 2009.