George Russell and Kimi Antonelli were summoned by Toto Wolff following the Montreal Sprint to discuss the rules of engagement.
Coming off the back of three successive wins, Antonelli was clearly on a roll, while his teammate, a previous winner in Canada, was keen to reassert himself having fallen twenty points behind.
As entertaining as it was for the rest of us, in the Mercedes garage it was heart in mouth time, the German team having experienced similar scenarios in the days of Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg.
As they battled for the lead, Antonelli accused his teammate of being “very naughty”, claiming that Russell had pushed him off and deserved a penalty.
“Let’s get this back under control,” he was told by Pete Bonnington, “focus on Norris”, while Wolff subsequently told the teenager to “concentrate on the driving, not on the radio moaning”.
Despite the warnings, Antonelli continued to battle his teammate, claiming post-race that he’d been bumped off while trying to make a pass.
Understandably, the pair were summoned by Wolff.
“After the sprint, there was a sit down and a chat with Toto and the two drivers just talking about how the sprint had gone and how they wanted to race each other going forward,” reveals Bradley Lord.
“I think Kimi referred to it as a little bit like being called to the headmaster’s or the principal’s office,” he added.
“It was actually a very constructive and very amicable conversation,” he continued, “but the message from the drivers was really, really clear. ‘Trust us to race each other. That’s what you’ve hired us to do, and we can do it’.”
“Most of it is absolutely fine,” added Trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin, “and you always want to let the drivers race. “If the team is doing a good job, you’ve had the right conversations beforehand, you don’t have to interfere.
“There were a couple of points there where it got too close for comfort,” he admitted, in a masterpiece of understatement. “There was one point where it looked like one could have ended up going into the back of the other, which we will do everything we can to try and avoid.
“But the two of them want to be allowed to race. They know that they need to deliver on their end of the bargain, which is to race fairly, race without risking a DNF. Don’t hit each other. We had good discussions during the weekend. We’ll have good discussions ahead of the next race.”
Clearly the chat had little impact for the pair were at it hammer and tongs again next day, indeed they were battling for the lead when Russell suffered the catastrophic battery failure that allowed Antonelli to extend his championship lead to 43 points.