Following the hectic circumstances in the build-up to the Miami Grand Prix, Formula One commentator Martin Brundle has said that he no longer loves conducting his pre-race gridwalks.
Max Verstappen won the race on Sunday, although much of the discussion surrounding the inaugural event in Miami focused on what happened off the track rather than on it.
Throughout the weekend, the paddock was swarmed with celebrities, especially shortly before the race started, when the likes of Venus and Serena Williams, David Beckham, and DJ Khaled descended upon the grid.
Brundle, who raced in Formula One for nearly a decade, is now a famed analyst whose gridwalks have been a mainstay of the sport’s broadcast since 1997, but Sunday was a nightmare for the 62-year-old as he tried to push his way through crowds and ended up in increasingly strange interviews.
“There’s a reason why I’ve never watched back an F1 gridwalk in a quarter of a century of doing them,” Brundle tweeted in the early hours of Monday morning.
“You have no idea how much I dislike doing them but somehow those crazy moments have defined my professional career.”
“Oh well, that’s the way it is.”
The F1 pundit became famous in Miami after confusing NFL quarterback Patrick Mahomes for basketball player Paolo Banchero during the gridwalk.
Brundle has already made news in the United States, having been involved in a high-profile controversy with rapper Megan Thee Stallion at last year’s US Grand Prix in Austin after her bodyguard and entourage refused to let Brundle interview her.
One of her entourage members told Brundle live on air that he wasn’t allowed to speak to her, to which he famously responded, “Well, I can do that, because I just did.”
“I get ignored by Megan Thee Stallion, biffed out of the way by a man mountain and then told off by a Malfoy lookalike who doubtless was on his first-ever time to an F1 grid,” Brundle would later say on the matter.
“I have felt under pressure on the grid before but by people called Senna, Prost, Schumacher, Mansell, Piquet and so on.”
“Bodyguards visiting the grid for the first time don’t bother me, everyone’s got a job to do, but they could maybe learn some manners and respect on our patch.”
