F1 DRIVERS all wore an End Racism message before the start of the breathless season-opening Austrian Grand Prix today, but six of the 20 declined to take a knee on the starting grid.

Valtteri Bottas won the chaotic race, with champion Lewis Hamilton finishing in fourth due to a late time penalty. Fellow Brit Lando Norris sent McLaren’s garage into raptures as he sealed his first career podium, aged 20, with a superb final lap to take third place.

Much of the discussion before the event, which was interrupted three times by a safety car and had nine of 20 drivers abandon, centred on whether all drivers would take a knee together.

World champion Lewis Hamilton, the only black driver in F1, wore the End Racism T-shirt — with an added Black Lives Matter message on the front — as he led the action.

He has spoken openly about racism in recent weeks, following the killing of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis, attending a Black Lives Matter march in London and helping to set up a commission to increase diversity in motorsport.

But as footballers in England and Germany continued to take the knee together, F1 drivers were split on the symbol — with Kimi Raikkonen, Max Verstappen, Charles Leclerc, Daniil Kvyat, Antonio Giovinazzi and Carlos Sainz Jr. all excusing themselves from the action.

Leclerc and Verstappen took to Twitter before the race to explain their decision.

“I believe that what matters are facts and behaviours in our daily life rather than formal gestures that could be seen as controversial in some countries,” Leclerc said. “I will not take the knee but this does not mean at all that I am less committed than others in the fight against racism.”

Verstappen said: “I am very committed to equality and the fight against racism. But I believe everyone has the right to express themselves at a time and in a way that suits them.”

“I will not take the knee today but respect and support the personal choices every driver makes.”

Hamilton had called out other F1 teams on Thursday for not doing enough to combat racism, and said the sport still needs to push for more diversity. Mercedes is competing in an all-black car instead of the usual silver, while Hamilton and Bottas have End Racism written on the car’s halo.

Hamilton praised some drivers for speaking out against racism, but he still feels others need to do more and he raised that in their briefing before the race.

“Silence is generally complicit. There still is some silence in some cases,” he said on Saturday. “There are people who still don’t fully understand exactly what is happening and what the reason [is] for these protests.”

His action won a further concession from governing body FIA today, which announced that it will be donating nearly £1 million to improve diversity in motorsport.

The FIA said that the funds would be used to finance “internships and apprenticeships for under-represented groups to ensure that they can fulfil their potential and have access to promising careers.”