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Since 2017, F1 drivers have exchanged good-natured (and often hilarious) secret Santa gifts with one another. This year’s reveal video of the results went live you YouTube just a few days ago, and it has already hit 1.7 million views. Here’s one spoiler: photos of driver Valtteri Bottas‘ naked butt makes a cameo appearance in more than one exchange.
Meanwhile, Charles Leclerc was delighted to open his gift from Fernando Alonso: a new padel racket. (Padel, in case you didn’t know—until I looked it up—is a combination of tennis and squash.)
“I normally expect something funny from this kind of Secret Santa, but I’m actually really happy with mine,” he said.
Leclerc opted to give something silly to Zhou Guanyu of Alfa Romeo, who received his second (!) copy of teammate Bottas’ half-naked calendar. (Alfa Romeo’s Bottas is the free and wild type who is apparently very comfortable with exposing his derrière to the world, but in this case it’s for a good cause: for every calendar sold, $5 is donated to the Movember organization to support men’s mental health.)
Pierre Gasly, who once admitted his nickname was “Tripod” received an actual tripod from Nico Hulkenberg as a gag. When Gasly unwrapped the gift, he threw his head back and said, “Oh no.” No one really knows why Gasly sports that nickname. Get your mind out of the gutter.
Hulkenberg said the gift exchange was “the highlight of the season” for him and opened a mug emblazoned with a yawning emoji from Esteban Ocon from Alpine. The two share a private joke about that, Hulkenberg said.
Kevin Magnussen gave Mercedes’ George Russell a bouncy mustachioed emoji figurine.
“I’m quite happy with this, because most of these are just rubbish presents that go straight in the bin,” said Russell. “I’ll probably keep hold of this for a good couple of hours before I get rid of it.”
On the sweeter side, Logan Sargeant sent Magnussen a baby onesie reading “Shhh… I’m watching racing with Daddy” and a Lonely Planet book featuring the best road trips in the USA.
Alex Albon got a set of custom golf balls from Team McLaren’s Oscar Piastri, who gave himself away by including a photo of himself on Albon’s gift.
Of course, Sergio Perez sent Daniel Ricciardo a limited edition bottle of Patrón tequila in the tin he designed for the company this year.
“Thank you, Checo,” he said. “I do like tequila very much.”
It should not be a surprise that Valtteri Bottas received a hardback book entitled A Simply Lovely Look at Butts in Art with the inscription “Have a cracking Christmas” inside. Bottas guessed correctly that it was from Max Verstappen. In turn, Bottas sent Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz bright pink swim briefs decorated with chili peppers and a set of hot sauces. Cheeky, no?
The question remains: did everyone forget about Lewis Hamilton? It appears that way. Watch the entire video here.
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