Lewis Hamilton vs Fernando Alonso: The full war of words

Alonso raged via his team radio after Hamilton clipped him: “What an idiot!

“Closing the door from the outside. 

“I mean, we had a mega-start but this guy only knows how to drive and start in first!”

Hamilton said on Sky about Alonso's “idiot” jibe: “It doesn’t really matter what he says. I don’t really care."

Hamilton accepted the blame for the incident: “Looking back at the footage he was in my blind spot.

“I didn’t give him space.

“It was my fault today.

“It was my fault, I couldn’t see him, he was in my blind spot.”

Max Verstappen chimed in by seemingly blaming Hamilton: “It was not a car's width.”

Alonso recalled how Hamilton had crashed out of Spa in the past: “It happened in the past, also, I remember with Nico Rosberg, the same thing. So it’s a tricky corner.”

But Alonso was calmer post-race when he said: “I was surprised and for sure, he now saw the incident and he takes responsibility, which is obviously very nice from him.

“It was a lap one incident, nothing really more to say there or the stewards. They didn’t say anything because these things happen in that corner.”

Alonso reflected on calling Hamilton an “idiot”: “I was angry on the radio.

“The radio, anyway, when you talk, you talk to your engineer and to your team.

“It’s a shame that sometimes everything is broadcasted, because if it’s broadcasted, this is what you say now [in the moment], this [right now] is how you behave in the media.

“When you’re talking on the radio it’s only a comment to your team, normally.”

Hamilton wasn’t ready to let the issue fade away: “It's nice to know how he feels about me. And so it's better that it's out in the open how he feels.”

Perhaps the most cutting comment was when Hamilton said: “We had different results in our careers!”

The Hamilton vs Alonso rivalry

The Brit and the Spaniard were teammates for McLaren in 2007 - Hamilton’s first season in F1.

Hamilton went on to become a seven-time world champion, and would have set an all-time record with an eighth if not for the events of Abu Dhabi 2021.

Alonso won two titles for Renault.

Alonso told PA in 2021 about his relationship with Hamilton: “We have this respectful relationship, but maybe it is colder than it used to be.

“We have different opinions on different things. Lewis has a different lifestyle to many of us and that separates us.”

They will go face to face again at this weekend’s F1 Dutch Grand Prix.