Nico Rosberg particulars painful six-figure invoice from notorious 2016 Lewis Hamilton crash

2016 Components 1 champion Nico Rosberg revealed that he and his former team-mate Lewis Hamilton had been pressured to choose up the invoice following a crash between them throughout the Spanish Grand Prix in the identical yr he gained the championship title.

Rosberg and Hamilton had been each preventing for the championship within the 2016 season and as a method of stopping the drivers from crashing into each other, Mercedes chief Toto Wolff wrote it into their contracts that they’d foot the invoice if their rivalry resulted in a crash.

The 2016 Spanish Grand Prix noticed the team-mates crash on the primary lap. Rosberg overtook Hamilton on the first nook, main the seven-time champion to attempt to take the place again. The German-Finnish driver went to defend the transfer, which pressured his team-mate onto the grass and right into a spin. 

Each vehicles grew to become tangled and had been pressured to retire from the race.

“I had a contract that I needed to signal which stated that if ever we crash as team-mates, we break up the invoice 50-50, us drivers,” Rosberg advised Sky Sports activities F1 when requested about how his 2016 season in comparison with that of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri’s 2025.

“We shared the Barcelona invoice,” he stated, including that his a part of the invoice got here to “€360,000”, which means the total invoice was a staggering €720,000.

He added: “That was painful.”

McLaren’s Norris and Piastri had been each preventing for the championship this yr. The Woking outfit allowed each drivers to race freely with the one provision that they might not crash into each other, which they managed to stay to except a few cases.

Norris went on to clinch the title, and a late surge from Crimson Bull’s Max Verstappen resulted in a third-place end for Piastri because the Dutchman rose to second within the standings.

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