Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton: The Story of Brocedes

Lewis Hamilton: The Seven-time World Champion. 

Nico Rosberg: The Man Who Beat Lewis Hamilton In Equal Machinery. 

(Image Credit to @gettyimage)

As teammates, Rosberg and Hamilton were almost unstoppable. Across their four shared seasons in Formula 1, in which they were both driving for Mercedes, they won a total of 54 races out of 78. Hamilton won 32 races and Rosberg won 22. During this time, Lewis Hamilton won the championship twice (2014 and 2015) and Nico Rosberg won once in 2016, just before his early retirement from the sport. 

Around 2000, the pair both raced for the MBM team, which was a junior development team backed by Mercedes. For a period of time, they were teammates, which was where their friendship began and developed as they spent a lot of time together, not only sharing rooms at races away from home but also sharing the dream of making it to Formula 1.

To anyone who witnessed them kart, it was clear that these boys would become the future of racing with their competitiveness pushing each other further. From day one, they pushed each other to the limits on track. But the competitive aggression on the road couldn’t be more different from the bond that had been forged between the two young boys off-track. 

F1 BEFORE BEING TEAMMATES  

In the years before they became teammates at Mercedes, the two drivers had very different careers. Nico Rosberg made his Formula 1 debut in 2006 with Williams, while Lewis Hamilton made his debut a year later, in 2007, with McLaren. 

Lewis Hamilton hit the Formula 1 world by storm, collecting 9 podiums in his first 9 races and missing out on the championship by 1 point - Ferrari’s Kimi Räikkönen beating him to it. Despite this, he finished the season with four wins and twelve podiums - a record-breaking season for the young star. In 2008, his second season in F1, Hamilton became World Champion for the first of many time. 2009 was more of a struggle as the McLaren lacked the innovation and reliability that gave the Brawn GP cars the edge. The next three seasons with McLaren were similar, with the car experiencing some reliability issues. In 2013, Hamilton made his move to Mercedes, a team with a ‘mid-pack’ reputation and shocking motorsport fans.

Nico Rosberg, when compared to Hamilton, had a relatively boring start to his career. In his fourth season with Williams, Nico reached the podium twice. It was only when Mercedes returned to Formula 1 that fans began to see Nico Rosberg's potential. In his first season with the team, he finished on the podium three times and astonishingly out-scored his teammate Michael Schumacher (a 7-time world champion) by 70 points. 2011 wasn’t a great season for the team and Rosberg finished the season in 7th, however, he still outperformed Schumacher who finished 8th. The following year, Nico finally got his first victory in China. Despite this early glimmer of potential for the Mercedes car, the car’s performance only dwindled as the season went on. Continuing on from his previous years with the team, Nico still finished the season ahead of Schumacher, who would retire from racing at the conclusion of that season. Then came the previous star rookie, 1x World Champ and childhood best friend Lewis Hamilton.

2013: RIVALS ON AND OFF THE TRACK

As soon as the pair became teammates once again, they went straight back to the raw competition they had between one another. But, instead of the full-blown rivalry they had a few years down the line, the media initially labelled it as a “friendly rivalry” between childhood mates. 

Hamilton finished the season in 4th after getting a few podiums and a win in Hungary. Rosberg got two wins and a handful of podiums but ended up behind his teammate, finishing 6th in the standings. Both Nico and Lewis did excellent in qualifying though, securing 9 pole positions out of 19 races. 

Behind what people saw on the track, there was the beginning of tension boiling in the Mercedes garage. In Malaysia, there was some controversy surrounding the team orders at Mercedes. Hamilton was ahead of Rosberg but was slower and instead of Rosberg being free to try and overtake his teammate, Mercedes told him to hold position. Nico Rosberg complied but made it very clear he was annoyed with the order. This was a turning point for the new Formula 1 teammates because it signified that their competitive nature with each other wasn’t going to suddenly disappear simply because they shared a team. 

For the two drivers, 2013 was only the calm before the storm. The season had more mind games and silent competition than the explosive rivalry that was to come in the later years.

ALL OUT WAR: 2014-2015

The calmness in the Mercedes garages during 2013 was gone. Mercedes were by far the fastest car on track, leading to them winning 16 out of 19 races in 2014, marking the championship as a clear Rosberg-Hamilton fight. 

Mind games between the pair began in Monaco when Nico Rosberg, trying to take the championship lead that Lewis Hamilton was holding onto by three points, set the fastest lap in Q3 before going off the track on his final lap. This meant that Hamilton was forced to abort his flying lap, settling in P2 whilst Nico was on pole. Many people, including Hamilton himself, suspected Rosberg left the track on purpose to secure himself pole position- a qualifying spot especially important in any Monaco Grand Prix. The teammates went on to finish the race in the same positions they began it, first and second. After the race, Lewis labelled his relationship with Nico by saying, “We are not friends. We are colleagues.” 

By 2015, the pair of drivers had a serious strain on their once-friendly relationship. Lewis Hamilton went on to win the championship yet again, having won 10 out of 19 races that season with Rosberg winning six. 2015 really began to highlight Nico Rosberg’s frustration because while the rivalry between the drivers affected them both, Lewis had come out on top both in 2014 and in 2015 while Nico had to settle for 2nd. By the end of 2015 though, Rosberg looked very strong, winning the last three races of the season. 

THEIR LAST FIGHT: 2016 

2016 was a season most F1 spectators will remember. Nico Rosberg won his first and only championship title, topping Lewis by just 5 points despite Lewis’ ten race wins compared to Nico’s nine. It was Nico’s strong, consistent results that kept him at the top of the table.  

A forever memorable moment in the 2016 season was the Spanish Grand Prix, where both Mercedes cars collided on lap one, resulting in a double DNF for the team. Rookie Max Verstappen, who later went on to challenge Lewis Hamilton for the championship a few years down the line, won the race as a result of the crash. 

Then, just five days after winning his only championship, Nico Rosberg announced his retirement from Formula 1. The altering of the relationship between him and his teammate clearly played a part in his decision. He said that he had completed his goal and didn’t want to have to endure that kind of mental and emotional battle again. 

2016 left a legacy of being the most intense and passionate teammate rivalry to date. People have been quick to compare teammate rivalries such as current-day Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri to the “Brocedes” rivalry but nobody on the F1 grid has experienced the same closely related past as Nico and Lewis did. They grew up with each other. They raised each other up to their goals of Formula 1, but once they got there, they tore each other down. 

Article written by Darcey Stuart.