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# From Barcelona to Baku: F1 Has Been Here Before
- URL: https://slipstreampaddock.com/from-blackface-in-barcelona-to-baku-f1-has-been-here-before/
- Published: 2026-09-27T22:24:04.000Z
- Updated: 2026-09-28T18:21:34.000Z
- Description: Norris is the latest driver buried in abuse. Hamilton was the first — and F1’s 2026 answer looks a lot like 2008: a statement, a campaign, no consequences.
- Author: Kris Pinter
- Tags: Analysis, News

**Lando Norris is the latest Formula 1 driver to be buried in online abuse. Lewis Hamilton was the first — and the sport’s answer in 2026 looks a lot like its answer in 2008: a statement, a campaign, and no consequences.**

## The trigger

On the first safety-car restart in Baku on Saturday, Franco Colapinto locked up into Turn 1, hit his Alpine team mate Pierre Gasly and pushed him into Lando Norris’s McLaren. All three retired. The stewards handed Colapinto a 10-second penalty, converted into a five-place grid drop for this weekend’s Bahrain Grand Prix at Sepang.

Norris, whose title defence effectively ended in that corner, did not hold back. “There are some drivers who shouldn’t be in F1 to be honest… you should have at least a one-race ban. It is not driving that deserves to be in Formula One.” George Russell, Max Verstappen and Isack Hadjar all publicly disagreed that a race ban was warranted. Colapinto apologised and accepted fault.

Then the internet did what the internet does. Within hours Norris’s channels were flooded with abuse, and Alpine — Colapinto’s own team — issued a statement on Sunday: “Mistakes happen when racing at the limit and no matter the result or outcome, nobody should be subject to hateful or abusive comments… It has become a regular occurrence in recent races and cannot be condoned.”

## A pattern, not an incident

This is the sixth flashpoint in 18 months around the same fanbase:

- **May 2025:** Jack Doohan revealed six or seven emails containing graphic death threats before losing his Alpine seat, plus an incident involving three armed men that required his police escort.
- **Imola 2025:** a fabricated post claiming Mick Doohan had mocked Colapinto’s crash went viral; Jack Doohan had to publicly ask fans to stop harassing his family. Yuki Tsunoda was targeted with racist abuse the same weekend.
- **April 2026:** Esteban Ocon received death threats after the Chinese Grand Prix, prompting Alpine to publish a 1,200-word open letter denying “sabotage” claims.
- **August 2026:** FIA stewards were abused after a Colapinto penalty at Zandvoort — and his sponsor Mercado Libre poured fuel on it, accusing officials of “killing the integrity of Formula 1”.
- **September 2026:** Pierre Gasly said threats reached his girlfriend and family after Madrid. Before Baku, Flavio Briatore threatened to cut Argentine television’s access to Colapinto entirely if it continued.
- **September 2026:** Norris, for saying out loud what the stewards had already penalised.

Colapinto has condemned all of it repeatedly. There is no evidence he has encouraged any of it.

## 2007–2010: the original sin was being fast

Nineteen years ago the pattern looked almost identical — except the abuse happened in the grandstand, and the target was defined by race. Lewis Hamilton’s rookie season poisoned his relationship with Spanish fans on the back of his bitter McLaren feud with Fernando Alonso.

In February 2008, at pre-season testing in Barcelona, spectators taunted Hamilton — F1’s first Black driver — with racist chants, dark makeup, black wigs and T-shirts reading “Hamilton’s family”. The circuit ordered fences around the McLaren paddock and banners taken down. The Spanish motorsport federation declared its “absolute repulsion”. The UK sports minister wrote to his Spanish counterpart. **Spain was threatened with losing both of its grands prix.**

> “The truth is that I feel somewhat sad. I am in love with this country, and especially Barcelona and this circuit, one of my three favourites.”  
>  
> *Lewis Hamilton, February 2008*

The FIA promised to write to the Spanish authorities, consider sanctions and launch an anti-racism campaign. Alonso’s response? “This is not a racist country… This was an isolated thing, and the less it is talked about, the better.” Hamilton was abused on Spanish soil again during 2010 pre-season testing at Jerez.

## 2020–2021: kneeling, and abuse as the receipt for winning

After the murder of George Floyd, F1 launched We Race As One, the FIA put €1m into a diversity foundation, drivers wore End Racism shirts and several took a knee — though not all of them did.

Then came Silverstone 2021\. After Hamilton collided with Verstappen and still won, he was buried in racist abuse online. F1, the FIA and Mercedes issued a joint condemnation, and even Red Bull — Verstappen’s own team — said they were “disgusted and saddened”. The same season, **Nicholas Latifi** received death threats over the crash that set up Abu Dhabi’s notorious finale. He hired bodyguards for a trip to Winter Wonderland with his girlfriend and said: “It sounds silly to some people, but at the end of the day you don’t know how serious people are.” Hamilton messaged him privately to check he was okay.

## 2022–2025: when it became routine

At the 2022 Austrian Grand Prix, women were sexually harassed in the stands and fans reported racist and homophobic abuse. F1 responded with **Drive It Out**, launched with all 20 drivers, Stefano Domenicali and FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem. Domenicali’s line was the right one: “If you cannot be respectful then don’t be part of our sport.”

In March 2023 a Brazilian court ordered Nelson Piquet to pay **5 million reais (around £780,000)** in moral damages for racist and homophobic slurs about Hamilton. In December 2025, Kimi Antonelli — 19 years old, and now the 2026 championship leader — received death threats after Qatar and replaced his Instagram profile picture with a black square. Red Bull and Helmut Marko had stoked that pile-on with accusations of deliberate collusion, and later apologised.

## Everything has changed except the accountability

In 2008 F1’s answer was a ministerial letter and an awareness campaign. In 2020 it was We Race As One; in 2022 Drive It Out; in 2023 Ben Sulayem founded the **United Against Online Abuse** coalition, which secured €400,000 in EU funding in January 2026 and marked its first dedicated day at Silverstone in July alongside Domenicali and all 22 drivers. Reporting suggests the FIA is now building an opt-in pathway for licence holders to pursue abusers legally.

What has not changed is that the abuse keeps coming and nobody pays for it. The targets have shifted — from the driver who is different, to any driver, steward, journalist, partner or parent who wrongs a favourite — and the industrialisation is new: fabricated screenshots, coordinated pile-ons, sponsors joining in. The one genuinely new lever belongs to the teams, not the regulators: Briatore threatening to withdraw media access is the first time anyone has priced the abuse in commercial terms.

The lesson of 2008 was never that F1’s fans are uniquely cruel. It is that a sport which answers hatred with a hashtag and a pained statement will be back here again.

*The next restart is Sunday.*

## Sources

- [The Guardian: Norris targeted by online abuse after calling for a Colapinto ban](https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2026/sep/27/lando-norris-online-abuse-franco-colapinto-ban-formula-one-f1?ref=slipstreampaddock.com)
- [Formula 1: Alpine release statement over online hate and abuse](https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/article/alpine-release-statement-over-online-hate-and-abuse-following-azerbaijan-gp.MqW6k0nrD2GkoljzBaWno?ref=slipstreampaddock.com)
- [Grande Prêmio: how the fan abuse escalated to threats against Gasly’s family](https://grandepremio.com/en/f1/how-colapinto-fan-abuse-escalated-from-online-attacks-to-threats-against-gaslys-family/?ref=slipstreampaddock.com)
- [The Guardian, 2008: Spain may lose its grand prix after fans racially abuse Hamilton](https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2008/feb/05/sport.world?ref=slipstreampaddock.com)
- [ESPN: Alonso brushes off racism claims after the Barcelona testing abuse](https://www.espn.com/racing/news/story?id=3255381&ref=slipstreampaddock.com)
- [Formula 1: F1, FIA and Mercedes condemn racist abuse of Hamilton, 2021](https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/article/formula-1-fia-and-mercedes-condemn-online-racist-abuse-of-hamilton.1Ml2uo6t9cGtHOglVYxNce?ref=slipstreampaddock.com)
- [ESPN: Latifi hired bodyguards after Abu Dhabi death threats](https://www.espn.com/f1/story/%5F/id/33296322/nicholas-latifi-hired-bodyguards-abu-dhabi-death-threats?ref=slipstreampaddock.com)
- [ESPN: F1 launches the Drive It Out campaign](https://www.espn.com/f1/story/%5F/id/34316263/formula-one-launches-drive-campaign-abuse?ref=slipstreampaddock.com)
- [AP: FIA condemns harassment after abuse of F1 stewards](https://apnews.com/article/fia-social-media-abuse-franco-colapinto-91112ab5549f1463204e0668c69c1ca2?ref=slipstreampaddock.com)
- [The Guardian: Piquet fined £780,000 for racist and homophobic comments](https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2023/mar/25/nelson-piquet-fined-lewis-hamilton-comments-f1?ref=slipstreampaddock.com)