A $1000 gift almost got the Formula 1 mechanics of Fernando Alonso at McLaren sacked during an acrimonious 2007 season.
Alonso’s first stint with the Woking-based team, in 2007, was marred by an often intense and acrimonious rivalry with Lewis Hamilton.
The Spanish driver had been signed up by Ron Dennis as the defending two-time F1 Champion, partnered up with a rookie Hamilton.
Many, including Alonso, expected it to be a routine affair towards a third consecutive title with McLaren – with the 22-year-old rookie assigned as a wingman.
However, the reality was completely different. Hamilton was on par with Alonso right from the get-go, even outpacing him through the season.
This inter-team rivalry got so intense, that the back-and-forth acrimony of taking points off each other led to both of them losing out on the title by just one point to Ferrari’s Kimi Raikonnen.
Things were far from ideal within the McLaren, with Alonso leaving for a return to Renault in 2008.
Former McLaren engineer, Mark Slade, recounted on Peter Windsor’s YouTube channel how one of Alonso’ benevolent actions almost got his side of the garage “sacked” – highlighting how incompatible the two-time F1 Champion was with McLaren.
“At the Nurburgring in 2007, on the Thursday, Fernando came up to me and he said: ‘Can you give me a list of all the people who work on my car?’,” he recollected.
“And I thought: “OK. Yeah, I can do that.’ I came up with a list but I didn’t know what it was for. We have our pre-chat and at the end I said: ‘Oh, here’s the list.’
“And then a little while later, he came back in the motorhome and said: ‘These guys on the list, can you get them just to meet me in the back [of the garage]? I just want to have a chat with my guys before the weekend starts.”
As it turned out, Alonso used to share a part of his prize money with his mechanics at Renault. He wanted to do the same at McLaren. That said, it went horribly wrong after McLaren Sporting Director Dave Ryan sniffed this out.
“He [Alonso] appeared at the back of the garage with a bunch of envelopes and said: ‘At Renault, I used to like to share in my winnings with my guys on my car and it’s not something I’ve done at McLaren so far, but I’d just like to show my appreciation for you being on my car and doing such a great job.’,” Slade added.
“He handed these envelopes out and we opened them and I think there was 1,000 euros in each envelope. I was kind of gobsmacked.
“And he was very humble [about it]. He was just saying: ‘No, I really appreciate your help.’”
McLaren mechanics urged to refuse Fernando Alonso act of kindness
There was a lot of behind-the-scenes dealings at McLaren trying to resolve the rivalry between Alonso and Hamilton. Each suspecting the other was receiving preferential treatment made matters only worse.
Alonso’s act of kindness was threatened to be viewed in a not-so-nice way. “We went off and did our thing and, a little while later, Dave Ryan came into the motorhome with a face of thunder,” Slade revealed.
“And he’s like: ‘What the hell just happened in the garage?’ ‘Well, Fernando just did that.’”
Ryan threatened to hand each and every McLaren mechanic the sack if they did not return the Spaniard his money.
“And he said: ‘Yeah, I thought that’s what’s happened. Basically, you’ve got to give us all the money. You’ve got to give the money to me. You’ve got to give the money to the team. It’s completely outrageous, we can’t have that in this team.’,
“I was like: ‘Oh, OK. Really sorry. Didn’t know that.’ And he basically said: ‘Anyone that doesn’t hand their money back is going to get sacked.’
“It was made known and everyone gave their envelopes back. I believe the envelopes were basically given to back to Fernando and he was told never to do it again.”
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