14 Shocking F1 Temper Tantrums Caught On Camera

F1 drivers are cool customers, but like us humans, they too are prone to the occasional outburst of anger; often with hilarious results. Here’s our pick of the best tantrums ever thrown by an F1 driver.

1. Montoya vs cameraman

Following a painful encounter with a distracted cameraman, Juan-Pablo Montoya goes nuts. Juan-Pablo’s better-half tries her best to calm the oft-angry Colombian driver, with limited success.

2. Montoya unhappy again

Montoya didn’t just limit his outbursts off the track, as he demonstrated here with a few choice words about Kimi Raikkonen in the 2002 Belgian Grand Prix.

3. Don’t touch me man!

Felipe Massa and Lewis Hamilton had a habit of crashing into each other in the 2011 F1 season. After one such incident at Singapore, we were treated to this hilarious mini confrontation between the two drivers.

4. Schumi wants a fight

Furious after a coming together with David Coulthard at the 1998 Belgian Grand Prix, a hot-headed Michael Schumacher bursts into the McLaren garage and accuses his rival of trying to kill him.

5. Villeneuve impedes Fisichella, Fisichella blows up

With only one chance left for a hot lap to get himself into Q2, Giancarlo Fisichella finds himself impeded by Jacques Villeneuve. Not satisfied with gesticulating his anger from the cockpit of his Renault, Giancarlo pulls into the pits and storms over to Jacques for some shouty Italian words.

6. Coulthard and Schumacher again

There was absolutely zero chance that Schumacher could see these sweary hand gestures that Coulthard threw up at the 2000 French Grand Prix after a failed overtake, but you have to give the Scot 10 out of 10 for effort.

7. The blame game

After punting off Adrien Sutil in the 2009 Brazilian Grand Prix, Jarno Trulli sprints over to face the German. Skip to 36 seconds for the incident, and 1 minute 18 for the confrontation.

8. Vettel unhappy about his drive-through

Livid at being given a drive-through penalty in the 2012 Spanish Grand Prix, Sebastian Vettel feels the need to shout about it over the team radio.

9. Not bad for a number 2 driver

A subtle (and somewhat justified) tantrum from Mark Webber here. After smashing one of only two new-spec front wings in free practice, Sebastian Vettel was given the example on Mark’s car, leaving the Aussie understandably miffed. Still, it fired him up enough to take a convincing win on the Sunday.

10. Retirement by dog

A stray pooch wandering around Istanbul Park circuit ended then-GP2 driver Bruno Senna’s race, leaving the Brazilian rather irate.

11. Felipe baby, stay cool!

Felipe Massa began to throw a wobbly about having the correct visor for the rainy 2009 Malaysian Grand Prix. Fortunately, the warm, Mancunian tones of Rob Smedley are on hand to calm down ‘Felipe baby’.

12. Damn you, depailler!

A dice with Patrick Depailler and Jochen Mass saw James Hunt crash out of the 1975 Monaco Grand Prix. Marshals tried their best to take Hunt away from the track, but the hot-headed Britd wanted to stick around for another lap to give Depailler some furious arm waving. It wouldn’t be the last time Hunt had a disagreement with a Marshal, as seen in the next entry.

13. Hunt the punch

James Hunt clearly wasn’t in the best mood after crashing out of the 1977 Canadian Grand Prix, as evidenced by him clocking the nearest marshal round the face.

14. Mansell’s broken gearbox

Nigel Mansell was decidedly moody after the gearbox of his Williams failed in the 1991 San Marino Grand Prix, leading to this expletive-filled rant.

Bonus Video

It’s not just the drivers that occasionally lose their temper in F1. Having angrily broken up premature celebrations from those that thought Felipe Massa had just one the 2008 WDC, this Ferrari mechanic is so furious he head-butts a pane of glass.