Inside the world of WAGs and F1… and why they go hand in hand

Is Carlos Sainz a good arbiter of Formula One – and its WAGs?

The Spaniard is one of the most intelligent and engaging drivers on the grid, a decent guy as well as a star performer (whom Ferrari should never have axed for an aging Lewis Hamilton; Sainz is 31, the once incomparable Hamilton is 40), and the son of a world rally champion of the same name.

He is ‘old school’ in some ways – yet also a star of the Netflix generation that has transformed the sport’s wider popularity and thus put it on the radar of a younger and more female world.

So given his background in the traditions of the sport on one side, and links to modern relevancy on the other, you would have imagined he would understand that Formula One’s mystique now and in the past is, and was, indivisibly linked to glamour. I think he does.

Yet, after the Singapore Grand Prix, where he came from 18th on the grid to finish 10th for Williams, he was coruscating about the TV focus on girlfriends, saying: ‘It’s becoming a bit of a trend, which must have worked for them at one time, when people found it interesting to see our girlfriends, to see famous people on television, the reactions.

‘I understand that if there is an overtake, a very tense moment in the race, that the production team might want to show a reaction shot, if they have seen that this has worked in the past, but only if the competition is respected and you are always showing the important moments.

‘Last weekend they didn’t show any of the four or five overtakes I did at the end, nor did they show Fernando (Alonso’s) pursuit of Hamilton. 

‘They missed a lot of things. The other (showing the off-track things) is fine, but don’t lose sight of the main thing. For me, they go overboard a little by showing the celebrities and girlfriends.’

The camera panned to Sainz’s girlfriend Rebecca Donaldson and Lando Norris’s partner Magui Corceiro in the paddock. Charles Leclerc’s girlfriend Alexandra Saint Mleux (rarely seen without her long-haired Dachshund Leo) was also visible. 

I agree with Sainz. Sometimes the camera is not focused enough on the main action – say, a fight at the front of the field. 

Attention can turn towards some banal irrelevancy elsewhere, a fight for 15th, while Max Verstappen is killing someone at the head of the pack. ‘Formula One’ has some work to do here.

The sport should be first and foremost. But, but, but, Carlos… celebrity has always been part of the allure of Formula One. And your fellow drivers have sold their names on Netflix, by sharing a private life – the girls and the glamour. 

It is part of F1 that dates back to the post-war years, perhaps before, but certainly to then. The greatest jewel in the story was Grace Kelly, the Hollywood actress who added Hollywood stardom to Monaco, the sport’s supreme venue of legend.

‘Her Serene Highness,’ noted Sir Jackie Stewart, adding: ‘Serene was the word.’ His own wife, now Lady Helen, timed laps on a stopwatch along with her friends of that era.

And he and his pals would spend time swimming in the Med outside the house owned by David Niven – arguably the finest in the world – just along from Beaulieu sur Mer, on the Riviera, painted pink and worth a fortune.

Sir Stirling Moss was another figure in the tapestry, who said he gave up motor-racing after his awful accident at Goodwood in 1962, explaining that he could no longer drive and simultaneously wave to a pretty girl in the crowd. 

The girls, of course, were always ‘crumpet’, in the argot of the Spitfire ace he might have been, and before political correctness took its ghastly hold.

Hamilton was seen in the paddock with Nicole Scherzinger, his on-off girlfriend of many years. They held hands saying grace in the McLaren motorhome. 

The former Pussycat Doll was nice to the waiting-on staff. She was surprisingly rated by them above Jenson Button’s ex-wife Jessica Michibata. They thought she was snooty. 

I never thought so, but the girls at McLaren did. She was always nice to me and a couple of other hacks.

Button, however, thought one of my journalistic pals was too friendly with her. I most certainly won’t name names, but Button alleged of my mate, tongue in cheek: ‘You are trying to pull my wife.’

And there was James Hunt, who had a queue of BA stewardesses outside his door. As the great sports writer Ian Wooldridge wrote, James was almost, but not quite, an Adonis. Wooldridge loved him for his intelligence and style.

Hunt’s domestic life could be chaotic. I say this as a strong supporter of his son Freddie, now 38, who idolised his father, and looks like him, and who followed him into motor racing in the Le Mans series. 

James’s finances were often precarious. He asked Bernie Ecclestone, the sport’s godfather, for bungs. 

Hunt died aged 45 of a monster heart attack after a marathon snooker session.

All a part of the party. So, Carlos, you may not have had your overtakes on Lance Stroll, Gabriel Bortoleto, Franco Colapinto, Yuki Tsunoda and Isack Hadjar shown on TV. But there is a bigger picture.