Hats off to Formula One for letting cameras film and broadcast the exquisite embarrassment backstage this past weekend, because athletes and their sports are more interesting when we see their humanity and rough edges.
At the Malaysian Grand Prix, Sebastian Vettel stabbed his teammate Mark Webber in the back, robbing the Australian of victory. Thanks to television, we were there for the awkward but captivating post-race moment when they came face-to-face, still hot and sweaty and with emotions raw.
This was in the back room where the race winner and second- and third-place drivers go to towel off and guzzle drinks before the theater of the trophy presentation, where they climb onto the podium, wave to the crowds and spray each other with champagne.
Often, the minute or two of back-room footage isn’t much to look at. This time, it was television gold.
Sucking on a drink, Webber strode into the no-frills room, studiously ignoring Vettel. “Mark ...,” Vettel began, addressing Webber’s back, but getting no further.
Adrian Newey, Red Bull’s car designer, stood between his two colleagues, arms crossed, staring at the floor, seemingly wishing that a sinkhole would swallow him up.
Webber dropped into a plastic chair and shot Vettel a withering look. “Multi 21, Seb,” Webber said. “Yeah, multi 21.”
Great stuff. This was Webber venting his fury at Vettel in code. It felt like we were witnessing a falling-out between two members of a secret brotherhood. It was also very F1 - a sport that because of its mechanical complexity lends itself to techno-speak and jargon.
Although the precise meaning of “multi 21” wasn’t clear, it appeared to refer to the fact that Vettel, Webber’s so-called “teammate,” pulled a dirty trick on him by ignoring orders from their team not to race each other. Certainly, Webber’s sense of betrayal was evident.
It is wishful thinking to imagine that all other sports could or would grant such fly-on-the-wall access to cameras. We are not, for example, ever going to see manager Alex Ferguson deliver one of his famous “hairdryer” rants at players in Manchester United’s dressing room.
The tendency in many sports is toward less openness, not more. Carefully stage-managed gloss and froth is the bane of modern sport. But the warts-and-all glimpse into F1’s backstage made Webber’s anger more palpable and real.
Webber, whose time to really make a mark on F1 is running out because he is 36, had been on course to win his first race since the British Grand Prix last July. But Vettel muscled past him 10 laps from the end, with aggressive moves seemingly so risky that his team intervened over the radio to reprimand him, saying: “This is silly, Seb, come on.” AP