David Croft jokingly labelled ‘boring old man’ after Alex Albon Chinese GP criticism

Sky F1 commentator David Croft.

Alex Albon left Sky F1 pit-lane reporter Ted Kravitz a little taken aback by jokingly calling Sky F1 commentator David Croft a “boring old man” after the Chinese Grand Prix.

Formula 1 returned to the Shanghai International Circuit for the first time since 2019, marking Albon’s second Chinese Grand Prix appearance. But, unlike in 2019, his debut F1 season, not a point was scored this time around as Albon crossed the line P12 in his Williams.

Alex Albon jokes David Croft ‘boring old man’ at Chinese GP

The reason for this humorous, yet quite surprising tag related to Albon’s special panda-themed helmet for that Chinese Grand Prix race weekend, which featured the black and white panda colour scheme, complete with eyes and ears above the visor and a smiling mouth below it.

This was a design that impressed Kravitz and the majority of F1 fans, Kravitz reflecting on it as the highlight of a rather low-key race weekend for Albon.

“What will happen to the panda helmet? I want to know,” Kravitz asked Albon during his ‘Ted’s Notebook’ programme.

“Will you keep it? The best thing of your weekend is the panda helmet.”

Albon at first joked that it will be going “straight on eBay”, before asking “was Crofty [David Croft] complaining about it?”

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As Sky F1’s lead commentator, Croft has in the past expressed his dislike for how often drivers will typically change helmets across a season, considering it makes identifying them in the cockpit at times harder considering the lack of consistency.

“He was, yes,” said Kravitz in response to Albon’s question. “How did you know? Did he complain to you personally?”

Instead of a personal complaint, Albon knew Croft has “a funny thing about helmets”, leaving Kravitz at first a little stunned by jokingly adding, in reference to Croft: “He’s just a boring old man.”

And on that note, Albon made his exit from the paddock, as he and Williams depart the Chinese Grand Prix still searching for their first point of the F1 2024 campaign.

Their next opportunity will come at the Miami Grand Prix, taking place from May 3-5.

Like the Chinese Grand Prix, Miami will also be an F1 Sprint weekend.