The message claimed to be from an current group member and alleged that Mercedes have deliberately put Hamilton, who is because of be part of Ferrari subsequent yr, in hurt’s means at latest occasions.

It alleged {that a} “systemic sabotaging” of Hamilton’s automotive, technique and psychological well being has put the group on a “harmful path” that could possibly be “life threatening to Lewis.”

Mercedes boss Toto Wolff mentioned the group is treating the message very critically.

“It’s not from a member of the group; after we are getting these sorts of emails, and we’re getting tons of them, it’s upsetting, notably when somebody is speaking about loss of life and all this stuff,” Wolff mentioned on Friday.

“On this specific one, I’ve instructed to go full pressure with police inquiring it, researching the IP handle, researching the telephone quantity, as a result of on-line abuse in that means must cease. Individuals cannot conceal behind their telephones, or their computer systems, and abuse groups or drivers in a means like this.

“I do not know what among the conspiracy theorists, lunatics, suppose on the market. Lewis was a part of the group for 12 years; we’ve a friendship, we belief one another, we wish to win … and finish this on a excessive and have a good time the connection.

“And in the event you do not consider all of that, then you may consider we wish to win the constructors world championship, and that’s by making each vehicles win. To all of those mad individuals on the market, [see] a shrink.”

Hamilton mentioned he had not seen the e-mail when requested about it on Thursday throughout media day.

On a wider query about followers on social media alleging foul play, he mentioned: “They know that, in the event you have a look at the years, we have all the time been a powerful group, we have all the time labored actually exhausting collectively. I feel it’s straightforward to get emotional. I feel we’d like help, not negativity.

“After all there are all the time issues that may be higher inside a group, and that comes by conversations, by communication, and that is what we’re constantly engaged on. However we’re all in the identical boat, we’re all working exhausting collectively and all of us wish to end on a excessive. We owe that to our long-term relationship.”

Wolff mentioned there aren’t any exhausting emotions about Hamilton’s upcoming transfer.

“There appears to be a number of irrationality additionally as a result of we wish to achieve success with probably the most iconic driver the game has ever had, the privilege that we needed to work with Lewis as an unbelievable driver, an awesome persona that goes by the ups and downs like another sportsperson,” Wolff mentioned.

“I completely respect the rationale for him going to Ferrari, there isn’t a grudge, no dangerous feeling, the interplay within the group is constructive, so each remark from the surface on what’s going on within the group is solely fallacious.”

Ferrari boss Fred Vasseur, the person who helped lure Hamilton to the group subsequent yr, mentioned any suggestion of a group deliberately sabotaging any driver needs to be handled with disdain.

“How you might think about an organization with 1500 individuals, working night time and day, pushing like hell to deliver upgrades that we may kill certainly one of our vehicles, or injury certainly one of our vehicles? That is utterly irrational, and no person within the paddock may do one thing like this.

“We’re preventing for the championship; every weekend we try to attain one level greater than the opposite one. How may you think about that anybody would say ‘OK, Lewis, we do not wish to rating factors anymore with him’? This for me is totally irrational and utterly out of the scope of the people who find themselves doing my enterprise.”