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Vettel must learn to handle media, says Coulthard
Despite this year’s DTM participation, David Coulthard has become a part of Formula 1’s media since retiring as a driver at the end of the 2008 season. Having experienced numerous positive and negative aspects of the press in his time as a competitor, the Scot now believes that former team-mate Sebastian Vettel must learn in a similar way.
Having made his F1 debut under difficult circumstances, replacing the lost Ayrton Senna at Williams in 1994, Coulthard went on to collect his first win in 1995 before challenging for the 2001 title with McLaren, losing out to Michael Schumacher.
“When I began my Formula 1 career in 1994 I barely put a foot wrong in my first eight races,” the BBC television pundit began to explain in his column for The Daily Telegraph.
“Everyone wrote nice things about me. Naively, I supposed the journalists were all my friends and my pride was puffed up.
“Then came 1995 and a period in which I managed to take five consecutive poles, only converting at the fifth attempt. I spun twice on the way to the grid in Germany and had to return to the pits to get the spare car; I spun on the installation lap at Monza and the race started without me; in Adelaide I crashed into the pit wall under no pressure from my team-mate. Everyone wrote nasty things about me. Naively, I supposed that the journalists all hated me.
“…The reason I recall this is because it took me a while to realise that this is a battle you can’t win. There was never any personal animus against me. There were only stories. Formula 1 is a media-driven sport and journalists have a duty to report the good, the bad and the ugly.”
With double race winner Vettel having stormed to seven pole positions and nine front row starts for Red Bull so far in 2010, the German has generally been labelled rapid by a variety of reporters in the paddock but has also come under fire for a selection of driving errors, the latest of which saw him collide with Jenson Button in Belgium on Sunday.
“That is something Sebastian Vettel will do well to keep in mind now that the knives seem to be out for him,” Coulthard added.
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