‘Near impossible’ – Martin Brundle reveals his struggles with iconic grid walk segment
Martin Brundle has a tough time trying to talk to drivers these days
Martin Brundle regards speaking to F1 drivers as a key component of his grid walk segment, but that is becoming “near impossible” to do.
Iconic F1 commentator and pundit Brundle has become synonymous with his long-running grid walk initiative, where he is sent out onto the pre-race grid, armed with a microphone and unscripted, to see what and who he can find ahead of lights out.
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Brundle did his first grid walk all the way back at the 1997 British Grand Prix, at which point he had the freedom of the grid to do as he pleased. But, that is no longer the case.
“Literally, I was the only person on the grid with one camera,” Brundle reflected while speaking on the Sky F1 podcast about his grid walk segment.
“And I remember sitting down and saying, ‘This is the driver’s eye view when they come to the grid’, with the camera over my shoulder, because you sit on the floor of a Formula 1 car, and it just grew from there really.
“It was so easy back in those days, so easy, because there was nobody else to compete with. Drivers would stop by and have a good old chat. I remember talking once to Michael Schumacher and Gerhard Berger at the same time. And could do what I wanted and go where I wanted to. The grid was deserted, generally speaking, back then.
“But the grid now has, what, it looks like it’s got 2000 people on it from what I can work out.”
And those clear routes to a pre-race driver chat, Brundle claimed, are becoming much harder to find, to the point where it is now “near impossible”.
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He used seven-time World Champion Lewis Hamilton as an example, who Brundle said will go into a Mercedes debrief alongside team-mate George Russell rather than sticking around on the grid.
“A good grid walk adds a little bit of important information about the day, the race, the cars, or one of the cars, or one of the drivers in particular,” said Brundle. “Talk to a celeb or two. Must talk to some drivers.
“I am really disappointed if I don’t get to see some drivers, which is getting near impossible, actually, to find a driver on the grid.
“A lot of them, like Lewis and George, go back to the stations in the garage and do a debrief, I mean, on headphones.
“And a lot of the drivers do. They got off the grid, if it’s hot especially. They need to go and drink. They need to go to the bathroom. And they don’t want to be bothered on the grid.”
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