Remarkable: Why Vowles' F1 Monaco GP apology to Wolff was unwarranted

George Russell was left frustrated as Williams' Alexander Albon slowed the queue up behind him to make sure his teammate Carlos Sainz got a free pitstop window.

This prompted Russell to skip the Nouvelle Chicane and gained the place from Albon off the track for which he received at rather hefty drive-through penalty as the Stewards had let the drivers know ahead of the race.

These 'back-off' team games were promoted by the two mandatory pitstops rule that the FIA divised to enhance the entertainment - or to create it since according to popular opinion it hardly had any save for the qualifying.

But instead it gave teams whose drivers had qualified close together to stay out, back up the field whilst the driver in front built a big enough gap to pit and come out still ahead of the queue, effectively ruining the other drivers' and teams' race.

Williams' boss, stated 'that was not the way we want to go racing' and Wolff speaking to media sources including GPblog after the race revealed Vowles had texted him to apologise. And as it turns out, Mercedes were playing the exact same strategy.

Speaking to media present at Monaco the likes of GPblog, Antonelli admitted playing the 'back-off' game was a part of Mercedes' strategy all along, despite Wolff's later complaints and calls for rules to prevent these strategies from being implemented.

"It was like we were driving at the pace of Formula 2 initially and it was not easy," said Antonelli, before delving into the challenge it poses to drive F1 cars too much off the pace.

When asked if there was any thought given to splitting strategies between him and teammate Russell, the Italian revealed that the games Wolff complained about after the race, were the same that Mercedes had agreed to play before the race.