Nelson Piquet Once Faced Fire For Insanely Insensitive Joke Against Lewis Hamilton’s F1 Hero

Nelson Piquet is no stranger to controversies. The Brazilian shocked the F1 world after his racial comments directed toward Lewis Hamilton. Moreover, the Brazilian was back in the news a while back after an old video resurfaced of Piquet. The 3-time F1 winner made a crass joke about the death of his compatriot, Ayrton Senna.

Nelson Piquet has clinched the F1 title 3 times in his career. The former Williams driver was a splendid driver back in the day. However, his off-track antics have landed him in trouble. He has caused unrest and rage in the F1 grid multiple times in the past.

A while back, an old video of Nelson Piquet surfaced on the internet which attracted controversy toward the Brazilian. Piquet replied to the question in a sarcastic manner and made fun of the late McLaren driver, Ayrton Senna.

In an old interview, Piquet was asked, “be honest, who’s the best? You or Senna?”. Instead of answering the question, Piquet fired an embarrassing jibe at the late driver.

“‘I said ‘I’m alive’,” mentioned the 3-time F1 champion.

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Ayrton was an F1 legend. Furthermore, many considered him to be one of the greatest F1 drivers ever. However, Senna died during the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix.

Why Nelson Piquet had to apologize to Mercedes star Lewis Hamilton?

The former McLaren driver caused a huge stir in the paddock after his disgraceful racial comments for Lewis Hamilton. The Brazilian blamed the Mercedes driver for the collision with his daughter’s boyfriend, Max Verstappen, at the 2021 British Grand Prix. He used a racial slur while mentioning the 7-time champion. Apart from backlash from fans, he also received a lifetime ban from the paddock.

The Brazilian issued a statement of apology to Lewis. Furthermore, he said that his word was misinterpreted in translation. Piquet stated, “I would like to clear the stories circulating in the media about a comment I made in an interview last year. What I said was ill thought out, and I make no defense for it.”

He further said, “But I will clarify that the term used is one that has widely and historically been used in Brazilian Portuguese for a synonym for ‘guy’ or ‘person’ and was never intended to offend.”

“I strongly condemn any suggestion that the word was used by me with the aim of belittling a driver because of his skin color. I apologize wholeheartedly to anyone that was affected, including Lewis, who is an incredible driver, but the translation in some media that is now circulating on social media is not correct.”

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F1 has been working tremendously hard to create a diverse working environment. Despite that, Lewis Hamilton was subjected to racism, the very thing he stands to fight against. What did you make of the Brazilian’s comments?