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jamie chadwick and anthony davidson find verstappen swearning unacceptable

Sky Sports analysts say Verstappen's swearing is "unacceptable"

21 September at 08:55

Anthony Davidson has branded the language used by Max Verstappen at the Singapore Grand Prix as unacceptable, as the FIA look to clamp down on the amount of swearing in the sport.

During Thursday's press conference at the Marina Bay Circuit, Verstappen resorted to words, saying that his car was "f*****" at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix last weekend, just after the FIA president, Mohammed Ben Sulayem, warned drivers about their language.

The Dutchman was then told to 'watch his language' by the press conference host. Verstappen was given a community service penalty by the FIA stewards after his expletive.

Chadwick and Davidson agree on Verstappen's penalty 

In the paddock, it has been quite the topic of conversation, and at Sky Sports, current Indy NXT driver Jamie Chadwick and former F1 driver Davison were asked about the clamp down on swearing in the sport, as they also agreed that Verstappen did deserve a penalty for his choice of words.

Chadwick, taking to Sky Sports, started by saying: "A lot of people are saying, 'If you put a microphone on every sportsperson, I'm sure to hear a lot of things you don't want to hear'. But, on the flip side of that, we do hear them. From what I've noticed in a lot of junior motorsport paddocks. you learn bad habits and you learn to speak the language that you see your heroes speaking. So I think it is important we clamp down on it. Max using bad language in a press conference wasn't whilst he was driving at ludicrous speeds, but there's a fine line there for sure."

It has not been a clean weekend for the British broadcasters either, as pit lane reporter Ted Kravitz was caught swearing on TV. He apologised very quickly.

Davidson, also working for Sky Sports this weekend, had the exact same opinion as co-worker Chadwick. "It's one thing losing your cool in a cockpit travelling over 200mph, it's a fight out there, you're in fight mode in your head, and you're not aware a lot of the time at that moment that what you say is broadcast to the world. It's you and your engineer, that's what you think, and you can lose your cool," the former F1 driver stated.

But, the Brit also said, "There's one thing losing your cool in the car and then being slack out of the car and I think what we heard from Max and maybe a few others after it being announced, that's unacceptable."

This article was written in collaboration with Ludo van Denderen