28 May 2024 , 11:53
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Martin Brundle saw "great irony" in the complaints made by Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen as they panned the Monaco Grand Prix.
As has become common in recent years, the Monte Carlo race was not one to remember. Charles Leclerc won his home race for the first time, while the first lap saw plenty of drama including a three-car pile-up involving Sergio Perez.
Otherwise, though, it was devoid of any real action. Formula 1's two biggest names, Hamilton and Verstappen, both had their complaints about the event - the latter expressing his frustration over the radio while he was still driving around.
"F*** me, this is really boring. Should have brought my pillow," moaned the Red Bull driver. And, after the race, he followed that up by saying: "We are driving literally half-throttle on the straights, in a higher gear than you would normally do, four seconds off the pace. That's not really racing.
"We all know in Monaco what is like. In the last few years it is even more difficult with the width of the cars but it is nothing new. I would like to change if possible a few little things because it would make will make it more exciting. Overall the weekend is really cool but it's the Sunday race that is a little bit boring."
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Mercedes racer Hamilton concurred and said in his own interview: "It was non-eventful. Everyone drove so slowly. It didn't matter what tyre you were on. We were driving seconds off the pace.
"I don't know what it was like watching but I am sure people were falling asleep. I can only imagine. We have to find ways of spicing it up a bit more, maybe three mandatory stops?"
Brundle agreed with both drivers that the race was hardly a must-see for fans. But he couldn't help pointing out that at least it had a different winner to usual - and that plenty of others might have said that their own respective periods of dominating F1 in the past will have also been "boring" to many fans and other competitors too.
The Sky Sports F1 pundit wrote in his column: "Lewis Hamilton said it was one of the worst races he's driven in, and Max Verstappen's pillow talk was painful when he said he wished he had one for a sleep during the race.
"Now the great irony here is that those two drivers didn't care one bit while we all had to observe them relentlessly winning races and championships by a country mile, but they were right, it was lacklustre to say the least."