LEWIS HAMILTON was demoted a position at the Singapore Grand Prix after Fernando Alonso launched a stunning explicit blast down the team radio.
star had looked to be ending his weekend in strong form when he jostled with rookie Kimi Antonelli for P5 with just three laps to go of the race.
Lewis Hamilton was hit with a five-second time penalty at the Singapore GP for exceeding track limits
Fernando Alonso launched into an X-rated blast down the radio about the moves
However, Hamilton, 40, then suffered a mechanical issue as he lost his front left set of brakes.
That left him severely crippled as he tried to limp home.
He firstly had to give up his P6 position for team-mate , dropping him to P7.
But Hamilton’s loss of brakes meant he was going incredibly slowly, which brought old rival into play despite there having been a gap of around 50 seconds between them before the issue.
Hamilton’s former team-mate whizzed around the Marina Street Bay Circuit to try and catch up and ended up within half a second as they crossed the line in P7 and P8 respectively.
However, Alonso, 44, then launched into a massive X-rated rant down the Aston Martin the team radio.
This was because he had spotted Hamilton running well wide of track limits as he desperately tried to avoid losing position to the two-time world champion.
Over the team radio after crossing the line, Alonso was heard saying: “I cannot f****** believe it. I mean, I cannot f****** believe it. I cannot f****** believe it. Is it safe to drive with no brakes?
“For me, you cannot drive when the car is unsafe. Sometimes they try to disqualify me with no mirror, and now you have no brakes and everything is fine? I doubt it.”
Sure enough, Hamilton was called into the Stewards’ office for questioning as they investigated the alleged breach.
In FP3 Hamilton had avoided a punishment for an alleged speeding infringement under red flag conditions, with stewards deeming he had not driven in an unsafe manner.
But he would not be as lucky this time around, as he was hit with a five-second time penalty for exceeding track limits.
The FIA hearing on the decision confirmed Hamilton admitted to leaving the track on multiple occasions as he tried to manage his brake situation.
However, following consultation of the Driving Standards Guidelines, Stewards ruled this was “not a justifiable reason” to leave the track, and thus dished out a five-second penalty.
Both the Scuderia and seven-time world champion did not contest the ruling.
The decision saw Hamilton demoted down to P8 in the final classification as the time was added to his final race time.
Hamilton said of his brake problem following the race: “It was an OK race. I didn’t get a great start. Very difficult to overtake and I was stuck in position.
“I was catching Kimi then the brakes gave up. You saw the spark coming off the left front.
“I had to back off to cool them down and when I cooled them down they came back a bit, but still not fully there…
“There was potential to be third or fourth this weekend, if we had perfected the tyre performance and not queued at the end of the pit lane for example.
“In the race, we were on par with a couple of cars ahead of us. If we can get qualifying fixed, which is very hard, maybe we can get slightly better results but, ultimately, we are starting for fourth, fifth, sixth at best.”
The who recreated Hamilton’s iconic pose following his own Silver Arrows victory in Singapore in 2018.
The podium was made up by and , who has now closed the gap on drivers championship leader Oscar Piastri to 22 points.
were crowned as winners of the Constructors’ Championship this weekend, but the celebrations were overshadowed by a lap 1 collision between the Papaya team-mates which had .
