Outgoing Red Bull Chief Technical Officer Adrian Newey has claimed the British media’s Formula 1 television coverage caused the “demonisation”
Yeah sure, there definitely has been a history of bias in favor of British drivers and teams by Sky - no question. But they’ve also damn near revered Max as god since his first race in F1, so I don’t totally buy his logic there.
Moreover, I think Newey is discounting the fact that people just have a strong tendency to root for the underdog or root for the fall of the king. Vettel was despised during his reign, as was Hamilton, and now largely the same with Max.
Tbh Max doesn’t feel near as hated as Vettel or Schumacher, and definitely nowhere near as hated as Hamilton.
Also demonization of Dutch f1 fans.
Tifosi booing Hamilton
Sky: “ahh so much passion”
Dutch F1 fans booing Hamilton
Sky: ”Human resources? We got racists in here”
I think another factor was both their on-track behaviour, bordering childishly stubborn anger, being overly aggressive. The ‘red mist’ I call it.
That was what turned me off them.Huh? If anything Sky has been overly joyous over Max. Seriously, look at even the moment Max won the WDC in 2021, Crofty was shouting with excitement, despite everyone knowing what Masi did was bullshit.
They had Horner in interviews far more than any TP, it felt like every 15 minutes! That’s died down a bit since the allegations against him, though.
Sky definitely talk about British drivers more (duh, they’re the British broadcast), but they’ve never seemed mean to non-british drivers.
Anybody who thinks sky has an awful bias clearly hasn’t watched Dutch or German F1 coverage. Shit, Viggo sports was literally sponsored by Max Verstappen for a while. Think about that for a moment. Sports coverage, sponsored by an athlete from that sport!
I think this is mostly a case of someone thinking the world is against him/his camp, because he isn’t privy to the hate that also gets spewed to others.