Why Abu Dhabi 2021 was Brundle's "most unpleasant" F1 commentary moment

Brundle has been a commentator for decades, working for ITV, BBC, and now Sky Sports. After finishing his F1 racing career in the 90s, he later started working alongside legendary commentator Murray Walker. He has covered nearly everything in recent F1 history, but one "unpleasant" moment sticks out.

"The most unpleasant time I’ve known in all these years of commentating was Abu Dhabi 2021, and 2021 in general," Brundle said on the Sky Sports F1 podcast.

Why Abu Dhabi 2021 was uncomfortable for Brundle

Brundle revealed his secrets to commentating on F1 Grands Prix. "I’ve got my touchstones in the paddock where we trade information, three or four people. If something big is going up, I will go and talk to Zak [Brown], Christian [Horner], Toto [Wolff], go and talk to somebody. And they won’t tell me lies. If they can’t tell me, they won’t tell me, or they’ll tell me something. I would say 60 or 70 per cent of what I know I can never say on the TV, but that does give me the other 30 per cent," Brundle said.

Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton battled throughout the 2021 season in one of the most intense World Championship duels in the history of the sport. But Brundle explains how Sky got caught up in the "crossfire".

"It became so feisty, so aggressive between Mercedes and Red Bull and Sky kind of got caught up in the middle of that. We got caught in the crossfire, basically. And each team pretty much felt if you weren’t with them, you had to be against them. And they both felt that. And it was really uncomfortable, actually, that whole phase. But friendships remained, and we all moved on," Brundle concluded.

Earlier in the year, Adrian Newey spoke out about how he felt Sky "demonised" Verstappen during the 2021 season.