Hill sees F1 pressure cauldron in Saudi Arabia

DAMON Hill believes Christian Horner’s comments in Qatar prove that “pressure and anxiety” is building ahead of the Formula One title showdown over the next week-and-a-half.

Red Bull team boss Horner saw Lewis Hamilton close the gap to championship leader Max Verstappen as he won the inaugural race in Doha last month.

Hamilton roared to a lights-toflag victory, taking the Mercedes driver to within eight points of Red Bull’s Verstappen with two races to go.

The first of those comes on Sunday as F1 visits Saudi Arabia for the first time, taking to the streets of Jeddah.

It remains to be seen if the racing will be more wheel to wheel than in Qatar but, while the grand prix lacked some of the excitement of recent weeks on the track, Horner and his Mercedes counterpart Toto

Wolff more than made amends off it.

Horner was hauled up in front of the stewards for comments he made about a trackside marshal, having already verbally jousted with Wolff in a press conference.

He said he had “no relationship” with the Austrian, was not there to “kiss his a**e” and would not be spending Christmas with him – unless Wolff was “in panto this year”.

Hill feels the actions show the “exhausting” nature of being in charge of a team fighting for both the drivers’ and constructors’ championships.

“There’s definitely pressure and anxiety – it is getting so close and so tight,” he said.

“All that hard work and there must have been times this season where they (Red Bull) thought ‘this is doable’ and then they see the gap closing.”

Hannah Miley in her element.