Lewis Hamilton hits out at Verstappen over ‘abuse’ double standard

Lewis Hamilton has hit out at the media's double standard with Max Verstappen, following the response to his team radio exchange with Riccardo Adami at the Australian Grand Prix.

The Formula 1 legend's first race with Ferrari last time out saw the Scuderia struggle in the changeable conditions, and Hamilton’s frustrations were made public via his team radio exchanges with new race engineer Adami.

However, their tense messages attracted the attention of the media with the 40-year-old curtly requesting Adami not to repeat instructions, declaring: "leave me to it please," alongside several other sharp exchanges.

Fiery conversations between a driver and a race engineer are common during a grand prix, with Verstappen and his race engineer Gianpiero Lambiase often involved in heated exchanges, including a memorable X-rated tirade from the champion last season at the Hungarian GP.

Hamilton hits back at team radio criticism

Hamilton has now hit back at criticism he received for his own demeanor over the radio ahead of this weekend's Chinese GP, confirming that there was no issue between himself and Adami.

"Naturally, everyone over-egged. It was literally just a back-and-forth," Hamilton told Sky F1.

"I was very polite in how I had suggested it. I said: 'leave it to me, please'.

"I wasn't saying 'f*** you'. I wasn't swearing. So it was just at that point, I was really struggling with the car and I needed full focus on these couple of things.

"We're getting to know each other. He's obviously had two champions or more in the past and there's no issues between us still."

Hamilton also called out the media for not covering Verstappen's verbal ‘abuse’ to the same extent as his interactions with Adami after Melbourne, labelling the Dutchman's tirades as 'far worse'.

"Go and listen to the radio calls with others and their engineers, far worse," Hamilton added.

"The conversation that Max has with an engineer over the years, the abuse that the poor guy's taken and you [the media] never write about it, but you wrote about the smallest little discussion I had with mine."

READ MORE: FIA announce Ferrari penalty verdict at Chinese Grand Prix

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