Max Verstappen: Red Bull driver accepts blame for controversial clash with George Russell at Spanish Grand Prix
Max Verstappen and George Russell made contact twice during the latter stages of the Spanish Grand Prix; Verstappen has accepted blame for the second contact which Russell says “felt deliberate”; stewards gave Verstappen a 10-second time penalty for the incident and three penalty points
Max Verstappen has admitted his controversial clash with George Russell at the Spanish Grand Prix was “not right” as Red Bull team principal Christian Horner revealed his driver apologised to the team.
Verstappen and Russell collided with three laps remaining when battling for fourth, making contact at Turn Five, after the Red Bull driver had been told to let Russell through.
The stewards gave Verstappen a 10-second time penalty for the incident, which dropped him from fifth to 10th, while also adding three penalty points on to his super licence – putting him one point away from an automatic race ban.
Russell told Sky Sports F1 that the move “felt deliberate” and was “totally unnecessary” while 2016 F1 world champion Nico Rosberg says Verstappen should have been “black flagged” for the incident.
“We had an exciting strategy and good race in Barcelona, till the Safety Car came out,” Verstappen wrote on Instagram.
“Our tyre choice to the end and some moves after the safety car restart fuelled my frustration, leading to a move that was not right and shouldn’t have happened.
“I always give everything out there for the team and emotions can run high. You win some together, you lose some together. See you in Montreal.”
Horner added on social media: “The Safety Car came out at the worst possible time for our strategy. We had the choice to stay out on older tyres or take the gamble with a new set of hard tyres.
“Hindsight is always 20/20, but we made the best decision at the time with the information we had. The result that followed was frustrating as it was looking to be an easy podium for Max and good Championship points.
“Max apologised in the debrief for his incident with Russell. The SC also hurt Yuki [Tsunoda’s] race, he would’ve been very close if not in the points otherwise if you look at the trajectory he was on.
“But that’s racing. It can turn in a split second. It is one of the reasons we are all so captivated and in love with this sport. It was a tough weekend, but we will be busy working hard over the next weeks to make some set-up improvements to the car and come back strong in Montreal.”
Verstappen is now 49 points behind championship leader Oscar Piastri, who won the Spanish Grand Prix.
The Dutchman, who eventually let Russell through later in the lap, was not keen to speak about the incident post-race.
He told Sky Sports F1: “Does it matter? I prefer to speak about the race rather than one single moment.”
What led to Verstappen’s clash with Russell?
Verstappen was on course to finish third behind the two McLarens until a Safety Car for Kimi Antonelli’s stricken Mercedes bunched the field together.
Red Bull put Verstappen on hard tyres, since they had no other new tyres, whereas everyone else in the top 10 was on softs.
Verstappen had a big snap of oversteer on the restart out of the last corner and was overtaken by Charles Leclerc, who briefly made contact with him.
Russell also tried to get through at Turn 1 but the pair touched and Verstappen cut the chicane to keep fourth place.
Red Bull told Verstappen to let Russell through, which appeared to anger the reigning world champion who was already frustrated.
“On recent experience and looking at recent incidents, obviously it’s subjective, you’ve asked for guidance from the FIA, from the referee, essentially there’s nothing come back,” said Horner after the race.
“You can see that it’s been reported. It’s going to the stewards. It looked for all intents and purposes that it was going to be a penalty.
“Therefore, the instruction was given to Max to give that place back, which he was obviously upset about and annoyed about because he felt that one: he’d been left no space and two: that George hadn’t been fully in control.
“After a conversation with his engineer, he elected to give the space back at Turn 5. There was contact between the two cars.
“Obviously the stewards deemed that he caused a collision and got 10 seconds and some penalty points, unfortunately, which obviously was very frustrating because it leaves us with one point out of the afternoon, what should have been an easy podium.”
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