Former Formula 1 driver and Sky Sports analyst Martin Brundle has revealed how his famous grid walks began.
For nearly three decades, the tense moments leading up to lights out have featured the chaotic grid walk, which has become a fan-favourite moment during a grand prix weekend.
The TV segment has had fans in stitches, with many loving Brundle’s impromptu celebrity interviews, including his sometimes cut-throat remarks after some on the grid snub him, and his pre-race insight.
During an interview with Natalie Pinkham on Sky Sports F1, Brundle revealed that the segment took place at the 1997 British Grand Prix at Silverstone when he was working with ITV, and that his former team-mate Rubens Barrichello was his first interviewee.
“He was my teammate the year before. That’s why I probably felt he’d talk to me,” the former driver explained.
“That’s when drivers used to come up to me in the next year or two and go, ‘You haven’t spoken to me on the grid. Come and find me. Why are you not talking to me on the grid?’
“Now they just look at me like I’m a double glazing salesman or something, or an insurance salesman with his foot in the door.”
Yuki Tsunoda, AlphaTauri talks with Martin Brundle on the grid
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
When asked if the grid walk was his idea, Brundle added, “Wasn’t my idea. I was at ITV at the time, and they said to me, the producers, ‘We’ve got an idea. Why don’t you walk down the grid and say what you see?’ Like, ‘All right, I’ll give it a go.'”
Brundle started his first grid walk by sitting down on the grid to show the point of view of a driver.
“That’s when cars used to drive to the grid,” he recounted. “They don’t now, they stop at the back and get pushed through because Niki Lauda used to come through, cut his engine and freewheel through, which was terrifying.
“It was dangerous. So now they all come through on trolleys, and I wanted to point out to people that you sit on the floor basically. I always say it’s like laying in the bath looking over the taps, is how it looks when you’re in a Formula 1 car.
“And then Keith, my cameraman back in those days, put the camera over my shoulder, and I think people liked that because we didn’t have many onboard cameras and all the sort of toys and tools we have today to see what the drivers are really doing, and data and what have you.”
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