How a Niki Lauda reminder was born out of Hamilton v Alonso clash

Watching and listening as Fernando Alonso closed in on Lewis Hamilton in Singapore and raged over the Ferrari driver’s failing brakes, Andy Cowell was reminded of Niki Lauda’s phrase for giving it everything.

Alonso was fuming at Hamilton in the final laps of the Singapore Grand Prix as the Briton racked up one track limit violation after another as his SF-25’s brakes failed.

Fernando Alonso unleashed on Lewis Hamilton in Singapore

Running seventh and eighth, Alonso was over 30 seconds down on Hamilton when he reported that he had “lost my brakes, lost my left front”.

Although the Ferrari driver backed off his pace, he still struggled to stay on the track as Alonso closed in on his rear wing to cross the line four-tenths down on Hamilton.

Alonso wasn’t impressed and went on a swear-filled rant.

“I cannot believe it. I cannot f***ing believe it. I cannot f***ing believe it!” raged the Aston Martin driver. “I mean, I cannot f***ing believe it. I cannot f***ing believe it.”

He added, “For me, you cannot drive when the car is not safe, you know. Sometimes, they try to disqualify me with no mirror, and now you have no brakes, and everything is fine? I doubt it.”

The Spaniard would later be elevated to seventh ahead of Hamilton when the Briton received a five-second time penalty for his repeated track limit violations.

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Aston Martin team principal Cowell weighed in on the late-race battle when he spoke with the media after the Marina Bay race.

Asked if “angry Alonso” was the best version of the driver, he replied: “I think we’re all like that, aren’t we?”

Sharing more details about the battle, the Briton said his driver was giving it all in line with a phrase the triple World Champion Niki Lauda used to use.

“I guess at the point we saw that Lewis had a problem, it was sort of give it everything,” Cowell said. “Niki Lauda used to have a phrase for that.

“Counting it down for Fernando, who was pushing hard. Lewis showed his competitiveness, didn’t he? To bring the car home. And I think the penalty is about the right sort of magnitude, isn’t it?

“It was flashing up, track limits. There were several track limit alerts, so the FIA were already on to it.”

Hamilton revealed that Lauda phrase earlier this year in what he billed as a baffling piece of advice that the Austrian would offer during their time together at Mercedes.

“You would say give him hell, but he would always say the word a**holes. That was always his thing.

“I remember at the beginning I never understood, like, “What do you mean? You mean give him, give him hell?’

“And he’s like, no, give ‘em a**holes’.”

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