Start, Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez, 2019

Horner defends Verstappen’s driving after Hamilton’s “torpedo” criticism

2019 Mexican Grand Prix

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Christian Horner defended Max Verstappen’s driving at the start of the Mexican Grand Prix after Lewis Hamilton criticised his rival over their first-lap crash.

Hamilton said he was “torpedoed” by Verstappen when they collided between turns one and two. “I thought at some stage I’d get torpedoed by Max,” he said.

But Horner believes his driver was blameless. “He was actually patient with the Ferraris,” he said, “he was ahead of Lewis, he braked early-ish, which allowed Lewis to get round, take the risk on the outside.

“Lewis then got a bit of a tank-slapper. They both ended up on [the grass], it was it was hard racing. I don’t think he did anything wrong in the first corner.”

The stewards decided no investigation was necessary over the first-corner collision, which caused both drivers to lose places.

Horner said it wasn’t this incident which spoiled Verstappen’s race, but his subsequent contact with Valtteri Bottas.

“The move with Bottas was a tough one,” said Horner. “It was arguably done, the pass. He got clipped on the way out of the corner with Valtteri’s front wing. It was just unlucky. Some days that can go for you, some days it can go against you.”

Had it not been for that puncture Horner believes Verstappen “could have challenged to win the race [with] the speed that we had.”

Pictures: Hamilton and Verstappen collide

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124 comments on “Horner defends Verstappen’s driving after Hamilton’s “torpedo” criticism”

  1. Lewis was very aggressive in his approach. Something he promised to do after the LEC attacks.
    And of course SEB was nog very nice to Lewis at the start..
    No torpedo, juust a typical starting incident after that Lewis just lost his car and tankslapped into Max

    1. You (and Christian) might want to watch the footage again. Hamilton didn’t lose his car, his rear wheel was tapped by Max who ran to the outside of the corner despite there being a car there. Not blaming Max, typical start corner incident but incorrect to say Lewis just ‘lost’ his car.

      1. @paulcook oh really, blame Sky Sports. Jenson said he had a snap of oversteer from the white line. I did think it was unlike Lewis as he is pretty inch perfect in melee situations, good to know.

        1. The onboard from Sainz showed Max tapping Hamilton’s rear wheel, which caused the ‘tankslapper’.

          Not sure how you have a tank-slapper on a 4 wheeled vehicle, but still. ;)

          As a motorcyclist, a tank-slapper is when the front of the bike starts oscillating side-to-side. Bloody terrifying, and easy to screw up the recovery.

          1. Max didn’t hit Lewis on his rear. Lewis was over ambitious going around the outside in turn one and lost his car forcing Max through the grass.

          2. tank slapper is a term from the times the fuel tanks had no separation and as a result the fuel in an corner suddenly flowed to one side. Resulting in an sudden movement of the car.
            Modern fuel tanks are build as a beehive with lots of small chambers, or like a sponge if you will.

          3. @anunaki Verstappen drove into Hamilton 3 times before they went off. All the cars are moving over to the right to going into the left hander, but Verstappen keeps pushing towards the left into Hamilton. That and all the contact was what caused Hamilton to wobble.

          4. I don’t think so and from the analysis I saw at Sky they also don’t think so.

            The funny thing in these discussions is that if someone’s favorite driver is ahead it’s their corner and all. But when it’s the other way around the other driver needs to let space.

            I think it was just a racing incident but the story that Max hit Lewis on the rear wheel is just not true. And the videos show no evidence for it all.

          5. @anunaki, as others have noted, the footage from onboard Sainz’s car and careful analysis of a slow motion of the helicopter footage paints a rather different picture.

            You can see that Verstappen took slightly too much of the kerb on the inside of Turn 1 – as the car rebounds on the suspension as he comes off the kerb, he then starts to oversteer due to the amount of lock that he is applying. If you watch the footage carefully, you can actually see Max slightly reduce the amount of steering lock on his car to counteract the slide at the rear of his car, which starts to carry his car closer to Hamilton.

            As the rear of Verstappen’s car starts to slide to the left, you can see that the left rear of Verstappen’s car clips the front face of Hamilton’s right tyre – looking carefully at the onboard footage from Sainz and the aerial footage, you can see Hamilton’s floor is damaged in that collision and see the debris being flicked up into the air off Verstappen’s left rear tyre.

            That is the only point through that sequence of corners where there is clear evidence of contact that can explain the damage to Hamilton’s floor that was quite obviously visible after the race. It is not until after Verstappen has struck the right rear tyre and the floor on Hamilton’s car that he then starts to oversteer himself – which suggests that contact with Verstappen was the cause of his oversteer.

            The problem with your explanation is that it doesn’t fit with the subsequent damage pattern on the cars afterwards. If Hamilton’s oversteer moment to the left was supposed to have caused the collision, it doesn’t explain how the floor on Hamilton’s car can be damaged when the rear of his car is moving away from Verstappen and Verstappen can’t have struck his car after that – and we can see from aerial footage and photos that the floor was already damaged before they went over the grass.

            The only point at which you can explain where that damage occurs is that moment on the exit of Turn 1 when the rear of Verstappen’s car is sliding towards Hamilton’s car, and then you can see a small piece of debris coming up from Hamilton’s car at that very moment. The only conclusion you can logically come up with is that there has to have been an initial contact between Verstappen’s left rear tyre and the right hand side of Hamilton’s floor – it’s the only explanation that fits with the subsequent damage patterns and the subsequent behaviour of the cars.

          6. @anunaki

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buv9xJ5i868
            at 1min 27 sec -1min 28 sec, watch the video top left cornerjust above the flags piece fly off into air after max taps hamilton, if you dont think this is true, you are ignorant and wilfully ignoring to see what is clear and without a shadow of doubt that is true… put the video speed to .25 before the corner on sainz view, a long large piece def fly off to the sky! it is clear as day and night, but of course if you want to see… those haters gonna hate no matter what!

      2. The damage to Hamilton’s floor was actually after Lewis lost traction himself going onto the green paint. He then got a tank slapper and lost it pushing Max on to the grass, Max’s front tyre then hit the floor, which is when you the see the bits flying off as Lewis went over the grass. Watch the replay after the 1st corner from sainz’s car and you can see his floor is ok, it was definitely the second part of the incident which was LH’s fault, racing incident, certainly not Max torpedo as LH has stated.

        1. Tank slapper is definitely not from fuel tanks swilling around. its from motorbikes when your knee/leg/thigh gets a bang as the bike pivots aggressively as it loses grip, slows, then regains grip. But its a generic term now. Ive had one on with my wheel barrow…for example :)

      3. He lost his car

  2. I actually think Lewis was 60% to blame for the first incident (as a Lewis supporter no less) but the second move was just stupid and way too optimistic. Verstappen has bullied Bottas a few times before but to expect that level of compliance from bOtTas 2.25 was not smart at all.

    1. Don’t know how you blame Hamilton for that?

      He made a clean move around the outside, Verstappen pushed him as much as he could get away with but his rear wheel took a chunk out of Hamiltons floor, then tapped his rear wheel, which caused the slide that people seem to think was a ‘tank slapper’ – it was not. Take a look in slow mo from the helicopter shot an you’ll see Verstappens rear wheel makes contact with Hamiltons rear wheel after he hits his floor.

      1. Already retracted it above. Sky Sports didnt show or mention the rear wheel contact.

        1. The coverage of the start was terrible all round.

          1. I don’t understand Sky’s post race coverage either. They skip the official presser entirely which often has great insight and adrenaline fuelled gems, way better than the pre race pressers which are as dull as ditchwater (which they do air)

            They then have Simon Lazenby and co just hovering somewhere in the paddock for ages going over the same stuff and grabbing an opportunistic interview when they can.

            Skypad with Di Resta is poor. He misses a lot of things Ant Davidson didnt (like the example above, rear contact at the start)

            Then some races we get Ted’s Notebook which makes the actual post race coverage look even worse because it’s great but sporadic.

          2. Yeah the Sky Pad is definitely missing Ant’s analysis, Di Resta chats a lot of bubbles.

          3. Just thinking Sky may have given up the rights to the presser, as these are now carried by F1 official channel along with a Ted type thing done by Buxton.
            With exclusivity I dont think Sky are really that interested in putting forward a good show. Same old nonsense trotted out, Croft wanting to talk about anything (the sillier the better) than F1, and the rest of the acolytes kissing his butt no matter how stupid he gets. And the pre and post shows are full of childish games with the drivers peppered with inane questions. I can’t work out whether this is a deliberate policy by Sky to dumb down F1, or the presenters are just plain dumb.
            Despite the draconian restrictions placed on them by Sky, C4 has a far better product.

          4. @riptide when you say F1 official channel are you referring to their Youtube channel or F1TV as I would like to watch it live if possible? Thanks

        2. RB13 – SKY Sports is by no means impartial; the commentators laud their favourites and denegrate those they do not personally like.

      2. Its because that guy has never raced anything in his life if he thinks hamilton was to blame. Hamilton drove clean but hard which is how hard racing should be. Max drove hard but couldn’t control his car

  3. Everyone(Hamilton, Bottas, Perez and Magnussen) gave Verstappen taste of his medicine and seems like he found it too bitter to digest. Horner also doesnt seem to like taste of sour grapes when his golden kid royally screwed up the best chance of winning GP for last time this season. Instead of beating sense into “prodigy” who can “win WDC” he is going around pointing blame elsewhere.

    1. I agree mostly: Horner does treat Max like the golden son.

      But to be fair, wasn’t Horner quite critical when Max went through that error-prone period last year?

      1. I think he was and Verstappen did improve a lot this year especially in 1st half. He was very clean and was calculated in attacks but all that seems to gone by wayside in 2nd half where he is more reckless and seems to be frustrated with something.

        1. about Verstappen’s 2nd half of the season… the end result have been indeed quite poor, it’s easy to blame Verstappen, but is this actually correct…?
          Spa was a racing incident, Raikkonen didn’t see him ( I am still looking in the rules books to check if that’s a legit excuse)
          Monza starting from the back due to grid penalties was a lost race regardless, clipping his frontwing maybe cost him one position…
          Singapore P3, but not being really competitive was a dissapointment
          Sochi… another grid penalty there
          Japan crashed out by Leclerc
          Mexico puncture by Bottas….. why people try to shift the blame to Verstappen while he’s fully ahead is just lack of judgement

          2 race with grid penalties
          3 being taken out by other drivers

          A crappy few races, but realistically not due to Verstappen being out of form in any shape or form

          1. @matn Completely agree. As usual, looking at the points is one thing, but looking at the reason for the points is always important. That Albon has scored 19 points more than Max since the summer break has nothing to do with Max’s pace and abilities, nor does it mean Albon is challenging Max. He’s doing great, but even the numerous posters since the last race who have jumped on this as an opportunity to shoot Max down would admit Max is obviously highly capable behind the wheel and Albon has everything to prove yet. Seems he’ll get there though and I hope he is Max’s teammate next year and can help progress the car alongside Max.

        2. @Chaitanya I think it is only people that aren’t fans of Max who think he has gotten more reckless or is frustrated. I think he is the same hard charging Max who is just rolling with the punches and being as racey as ever, and has had some rearward starting positions lately generally through no fault of his own. Since the summer break half of his last six races have had him starting from the back for all intents and purposes or taken out for example by Leclerc. The only thing that has changed for Max lately is his fortunes in some races, and that’s just racing and you just move on to the next.

          1. Stop the straw men arguments Robbie. Nobody is saying 2019 was Max’s worst year, or that he’s getting worse… we just resist the argument that he’s now a mature driver. Incidents like this are rarer than they used to be, but they still happen too often. And of course we aren’t fans, why would we be?

          2. @Xcm What straw man argument? I never said people were claiming 2019 was Max’s worst year or that he was getting worse. And I don’t hear his fans claiming he is fully mature but I sure hear non-fans taking every opportunity possible to claim he is immature…reckless…careless…never going to be a WDC.

            Why be a Max fan? Because he is astonishingly good, that’s all. But of course as non-fans, you can’t see past the dislike and acknowledge how special he is. Gonna make some mistakes? Sure he is. Like all WDC level drivers do. He’s got an amazing career ahead of him and I’m stoked for it.

        3. He was dirty in the first half as well just did not have enough moments of wheel to wheel to show it. Max’s pass on Leclerc was dirty and yet because the stewards didn’t want to punish their golden boy he is continuing to drive like a forza online lobby player

      2. No he was not. Remember, they demoted Kvyat for crashing too much. So anything below that is not critical enough.

      3. No Horner really wasn’t. He actually also blamed Ricciardo for that crash in Baku. Verstappen kept swerving back and forth until Ricciardo had nowhere left to go!

        1. Lol DR always had the option of a little less pressure on his loud pedal. I don’t recall CH blaming DR but rather blaming both drivers. They were having a royal battle all day. At the next race when both drivers were hanging out together on a boat being interviewed by Sky about Baku, they both said they were well past that and that they both were too greedy that day. Smiling and happy and yucking it up, both of them.

          1. He actually didn’t, Max turning back in front of Dan brought him into the wake of max’s car and reduced the aero on the front wing, causing his front tyres to lose grip and lock up… Dan also said later that managements dealing with the incident was one of a number of reasons that he felt he wanted to leave RBR.

            Max was a mess the whole race, I was surprised he hadn’t taken both the RBR cars out earlier in the race.
            He suffers the same level of red mist that Vettel does.

          2. @robbie yes Ricciardio could simply stay behind Verstappen. How “wrong” of Ricciardio to try and overtake a slower car……

            Sigh

    2. Couldn’t agree more

  4. No one’s going to mention how cool it was to see Max’s tire rolling across the grass/track after it came off?

    1. Indeed, the shape and trajectory that it took was a good demonstration of the laws of physics in action – laws that Brundle seems to think F1 tears up.

    2. @allstargp aww, I remember my first formula1 race!

      Welcome to the sport!

  5. Verstappen drove like an idiot on Saturday but he didn’t torpedo Hamilton into turn one. Actually, he might have been a bit too careful into the braking zone and it was Hamilton who ‘pushed’ Verstappen onto the grass.

    Most of the critism Verstappen receives lately is justified, but Hamilton should not the one criticising. On Saturday there were only two drivers who passed Bottas full throttle and they were Hamilton and Verstappen. On Sunday it was Hamilton who shove Verstappen onto the grass (albeit not on purpose but still), not the other way around. Don’t be a hypocrite Lewis!

    1. If Verstappen hadn’t tapped Hamilton’s car to start with, Hamilton wouldn’t have been on the grass. There were *two* contacts between Hamilton and Verstappen, and everyone’s ignoring the first one.

      1. I ignore the first one because I don’t see it.
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buv9xJ5i868

        1. Then watch again. Its pretty obvious from Sainz camera.

          1. No it’s not obvious. Max didn’t hit Lewis in the rear at all.

          2. @anunaki Verstappen rammed HIS rear into Hamilton. Perhaps it’s easier to see without those dark orange tinted glasses on?

          3. I can see a snap of oversteer where Max’s rear is moving towards Lewis. Hard to judge if that is the cause of Lewis’s oversteer but I give you that is actually possible.

            It’s not what they told on the skypad analysis though and also not what i.e. Palmer said in his analysis

          4. We know that Verstappen tapped Hamilton’s car with his rear wheel, because that’s when the floor was damaged.

            I think personally it’s tough to blame Verstappen though. He would know easily where his rear wheels are exactly and he seemed to leave a car’s width.

          5. (wouldn’t know)

        2. @matthijs You don’t see the contact even though there’s literally a piece of Lewis’ floor missing after it

          1. @retardedf1sh If you look carefully you can even see it flying past Verstappen in the video.

          2. @retardedf1sh @david-br
            I understand. I was looking for the contact that caused Hamilton to drift but that was not the result of the contact.

        3. @matthijs 8 seconds in to the video you posted. Verstappen flicks the car right and his left rear tyre takes out Hamilton’s right bargeboard. Racing incident but Verstappen had gone unnecessarily deep, as he loves to do.

          1. takes out Hamilton’s right bargeboard.

            nope, his bargeboards had no damage.
            Look again, and again..
            There was a part of the floor missing as a result of his collision with VER. That collision happened before the moment Lewis lost control and forced VER of track.

          2. erikje Sorry, floor. Though I’m lost to what difference it makes to the point! It was the collision that caused the loss of control.

        4. Max lost control of his car because like vettel he isn’t as good of a wheel to wheel driver as hamilton. Max is only good at overtaking when the other driver avoids the crash, if both driver play fairly max losses out most of the time just like vettel

          1. That’s why Max has some of the best overtakes in F1 on his C of course ;)
            LOL

      2. Again… Why are my comments being deleted or filtered out?

    2. matthijs – Vet and Ham both passed Bottas’ crash scene at full tilt – the difference is that there was NO yellow flag when Ham drove past but there was when Vet drove past and deliberately ignored it [as he admitted post race].

      1. Now that I’ve found my reading glasses – for ‘Vet’ substitute ‘Ves’, doh!

      2. @gnosticbrian You are right and I know. I am not here to complain about Verstappen’s penalty, that was completely justified. That wasn’t my point.

  6. I do think Hamilton/Vettel’s torpedo criticism is a little unfair – especially coming from the pair of them who at different phases of their careers had similar accusations thrown at them too, often unwarranted.

    1. I agree. Playing the blaming game is always lame. Be it Max, Lewis, Seb or some other driver, I don’t like it. Why don’t accept the Stewards verdict? They said racing incident.

      In my opinion, F1’s worst enemy currently is the press. They try to get strong statements from the drivers especially the ones where they bash other drivers. I know they have to make money but I miss reading about the technical side of F1 and F1 as a sporting event.

    2. Sky could’ve asked the FIA for the video that showed Max car hitting Lewis car at the first turn, but they didn’t because it didn’t suit their narrative. De-Resta had a chance to ask Max right after qualy whether he saw the yellow flag, but he went praising his pole and totally ignored Bottas accident. They’re have put Max on a pedestal so he thinks the rules doesn’t apply to him.

    3. @rocketpanda It is exactly what Verstappen does though. Clear example is Austria, but he did the same to both Hamilton and Bottas in Mexico.

      1. Lol non-fans and LH call it a torpedo, whereas the stewards saw nothing to investigate.

        1. @robbie sigh irrelevant.

          Stop trolling.

          1. @f1osaurus

            Stop trolling.

            Why is it your obvious “hate” in relation to Verstappen forces you to troll time and time again?
            You are obviously not a F1 fan and do not seem to understand how a race works and the risks a driver takes.
            Probablý your only experience is the f1 game with all supports in full mode ;)

            so again: stop trolling!

  7. Peter Windsor is one of the few journalists who picks up on this: Hamilton is a student of other drivers and their racing behaviours. It’s why he tends to have few scrapes and also why he can position the car to minimize damage if contact happens (Seb take note). Leclerc must have been a shock to his ‘system’ in a way as FIA changed the rules and Leclerc has altered his driving. But Verstappen is a known quantity and it was a calculated risk of Hamilton’s to pass him on the outside, ready for contact when it happened.

    1. He’s probably doing this since he’s driving in the dominant Mercedes. I remember Lewis having lots of incidents himself in the McLaren

      1. @anunaki Verstappen had the dominant car this time and it didn’t stop him from causing a multitude of incidents.

        1. I don’t see what Max has to do with this? This is about Lewis. It’s hard to deny Lewis had lots of incidents when he was driving. Mclaren. It’s probably experience as well. But having spend so much years at the front of the pack helps a lot.

          1. @anunaki

            It’s hard to deny Lewis had lots of incidents when he was driving.Mclaren.

            You’ve answered your own question on what Max has to do with this. Hamilton was crash prone in his early years but has since learnt how to play his percentages better. Verstappen it seems is unwilling/unable to learn.

          2. Lewis was Max’s current age when he started so he has time to catch up

          3. @anunaki You answered your own question. It has got nothing to do with driving the best car. Verstappen blunders just as much if he’s in the fastest car (Monaco twice, China, Brazil)

            Besides, Hamilton had really only one season, years after he started, where he made several mistakes in a season. Even then he made less mistakes than Verstappen made even in this season which is supposedly reasonably “calm”.

            Verstappen just doesn’t have it in him. It’s not to do with age either. Verstappen is more a repeat red mist kind of driver like Vettel, Maldonado etc.

            Little bit of a set back, an opportunity or a driver he hates and he gets a red mist episode.

            If he keeps throwing away wins like that, he’s not going to be WDC. Or indeed he needs an extremely dominant car.

          4. Sigh…stop trolling.

            That you would claim Max hates a driver completely reveals the way you view F1 and explains a lot about your poor attitude.

            Troll away…oh, all the while telling others who are trying to have a mature conversation to stop trolling of course.

      2. @anunaki A lot of those incidents (collisions) were with Massa, who definitely had ‘issues’ with Hamilton, especially during and after 2008. Most of the other issues with Lewis’s driving weren’t actually to do with collisions – weaving, driving too slow under the SC, outbraking himself, not ceding a corner sufficiently, fibbing to the stewards, etc. etc. In fact aside from crashing into Raikkonen in Canada coming out of the pits, I can’t actually remember many other collisions besides the Massa ones.

  8. Eventually that kind of behavior from all the other drivers against MAX had come. Its unlogical to think that after all this years were MAX shows his aggresiveness that someday everyone else will say “Ive had it”. Its not normal thinking in their brains, its subconcious because when you are near him its certain he will be hard and if you are soft you loose. We saw in Sunday Hamilton and bottas not to be chickens, in previous races we saw Leclerc that has not feared to attack even if his move was wrong.
    Its sad really and i say this because i like max because in the 1st races of the season he gave a more cool approach in driving but last Sunday was really bad in many occasions for him. I really hope that will be a one off for this year and from now on the MAX V2.0 we saw in the start of the season will be back.

    As i think it i understand him really.. he is in a team that the only thing he can do is to win maybe 2-3 races for the whole season… with an engine that is well.. not GP2 but slower than the big 2 with no signs of improvement for the rest of the season or the next one. What he can do? he is young.. remember yourselfs in his age guys. Maybe he needs a good proffesional guy near him to cool him down and make him see the big picture… his dad is not up for this job i think.

  9. The move on Lewis was fine imo, hard racing, little bit of contact, to be expected at the start of the race. The torpedo move was the one on Bottas, very much a case of just chucking it up the inside and hoping the other guy gets out the way.

  10. Sure!.. sure…

    Mr.Horner, you also noticed that Albon is handily outscoring Verstappen, right?


    Good.

    1. Yes he is outscoring him but he’s also much slower i the same car

      1. Sure!.. sure…

        Being fast and not score points is much more important than consistency and actually scoring points!


        Oh, wait…

        1. Sure sure Horner is also delighted Albon is putting a car in the wall in every other FP2

        2. you know Kubica has more points (1) than Russell. In you logic he must be the better driver then ;)

      2. @anunaki

        Yes he is outscoring him but he’s also much slower i the same car

        You are aware F1 is littered with many examples of ‘slower’ team mates beating their faster team mates?
        F1 isn’t about just outright speed. That’s qualy. Managing a race, let alone a championship campaign requires alot more finesse and skill than just pedal to the metal stuff.

        1. Sure but Albon needs to really speed up a lot if he wants to really succeed. It’s much easier to take no risks when your not even close to the limit. Then you need a car that’s much quicker than the rest of the file stond ever become second or higher

          1. the rest of the field

            That’s what I meant to put there

  11. It wasn’t really the first incident that ruined Max’s race, it was his mad rush of blood after it that caused his major problems.

    Probably understandable but by now he should be mature enough to know that he has 70 laps to make it back.

    Max needs to stop thinking he’s entitled to be at the pointy end and realise that at times he has to earn it. I expect he’ll get there but he’s probably going to suffer a few of these again before he has a car that is good enough to give him a chance at consistent wins.

    One wonders though how he’ll behave if Albon (or any other driver if they choose someone different) starts to consistently match him.

    1. “One wonders though how he’ll behave if Albon (or any other driver if they choose someone different) starts to consistently match him” – I suspect that Max lacks the maturity to handle such a possibility.

    2. One wonders though how he’ll behave if Albon (or any other driver if they choose someone different) starts to consistently match him.

      We already have with Sainz and Ricciardo.

      1. He crushed both.. so no.. wrong example. Try again.

        1. He didn’t crush Sainz at all! If fact they were very evenly matched.

        2. Errrrrr… Ricciardo was crushed? Oh dear.

  12. Ves is the man who brings the action, therefore there is much to discuss. I did not see any move on the track from Ham, Vet, Bot en Lecl. The only thing they did is drive a train to the end. Not exciting at all. Typical gentlemans boring behaviour. They are showing why it is not worth to watch F1.

    1. Yet they all outscored him.

    2. So you think redbull is telling their drivers “who cares about results, as long as you bring the action!”

    3. Driving the train all the way to the Championship.

    4. his action is costing millions of $$$ to the team.. try justifying that to the redbull board if this continues…

      1. yes, that puncture cost a lot.. NOT

        1. a potential podium/win vs 6th .. points wise calculate that … NOT??

          1. The payments in F1 are no longer the same as it used to be.
            So still no.

  13. Oh, come on Lewis, no way Verstappen was to blame for the incident.. it was exactly what you would have done in that position: try to squeeze the other guy on the outside.

    1. @gechichan Verstappen over-steered his left right rear into Hamilton (debris flying). Which destabilized Hamilton’s car and caused them both to go off track.

      besides, your own sentence also agrees that Verstappen caused it. You just think it’s OK.

      1. @f1osaurus I just felt Max left enought room and Lewis tried too hard to get back in front and oversteered into Max and then offtrack. Maybe I’m wrong and didn’t see the replays correctly.

  14. Max is aggressive and takes bigger risk – sometimes it is a spectacular pass and other times it falls just a little bit short (Mexico & Bottas). I am not surprised some drivers think about space when driving against Max.

  15. The Bottas “incident” was mostly on Bottas imho. There was a pretty big gap and lots of space on the outside to avoid contact.

    1. @anunaki Verstappen takes an extremely wide line. He goes all the way to the outside. No one else does this because there is a turn to the right immediately after that.

      Of course this was to expected because he dive bombed Bottas, but then you can also expect to touch the opponent with your rear wheel and get a puncture.

      1. You are allowed to overtake other cars and you can expect the driver that’s beaten not to hit you. In some cases this is of course very difficult but in this case Bottas is actually opening up before he turned in on Max. So he knew he was there but misjudged the space he had. This can of course happen but you can’t blame this on Max.

        1. Indeed, but most people seem to conveniently overlook that fact so they can blame Max.

        2. Well he could be more careful. He is always trying to muscle past others and survive by chance.

          Did that to Hamilton, Bottas and Magnussen in the same race.

          It didnt work even a single time. Not his fault again, right?

          1. he passed Bottas and he passed Magnussen.. he even was way ahead Lewis when he forced VER of track.
            So almost three out of three wrong for you ;)

          2. “Way ahead” : side by side and forcing Hamilton out of the track, touching and breaking the floor on his car.

            It must be annoying to support Verstappen, i suppose. One day you guys will ran out of ideas on how to always have the upper hand regardless of his mistakes on the track.

        3. @anunaki Sure, but Bottas cannot just disappear. His car is moving and of Verstappen parks his car in front of him then he’s going to hit it.

          Verstappen took that ridiculously deep line on purpose. That blocks Bottas. High risk mice. With a predictable outcome.

          How he overtook Magnussen off track and was allowed to keep that position is unclear to me to yes.

          1. All I’ve seen on the K-Mag overtake is the onboard from Max’s car. I said the same as you: why can he overtake him off ttack. Didn’t see any other shots of it, so I don’t know.

            For the rest I’m done with discussing. We don’t agree, it was deemed a racing incident by race control / the stewards, and some of the experts agree with me and others probably don’t. That’s OK

            Fact is that Max has a terrible 2nd half of the season and he is involved in some incidents. Some fully on others like Leclerc in Japan, some fully on him like hitting Perez in Monza and the rest a bit of both where you can differ in opinion

            Next GP is COTA in 2 days.

            Cheers

  16. Hamilton lost a chunck of the floor and still there is people here that didnt see any contact there.

    Unbelievable.

    Talk about spoiled. Thats why he never learns. Horner and the fanbase are living in a Verstappen fantasy camp.

  17. To be fair as long as Horner refuses to criticise Verstappen the longer it will be before he realises he needs to be smarter with his driving. Will be amazing when Verstappen is fighting for the championship and people ram his car off the track with nothing to lose.

  18. With everyone watching how VET is handling the competition from LEC, myself included, we might be missing the fact that VER is worried about ALB. RIC left and GAS wasn’t any competition in the first half but something has changed in the second half. Horner is just trying to help his fragile driver.

    1. In which world you are living in? Of all the crap in this thread about HAM, VET, BOT or other driver this is most insane comment from my point of view. Nevertheless I agree with you that ALB is performing ok (despite some crashes). I do hope that he will keep his seat in the RB in 2020.

  19. “Way ahead” : side by side and forcing Hamilton out of the track, touching and breaking the floor on his car.

    It must be annoying to support Verstappen, i suppose. One day you guys will ran out of ideas on how to always have the upper hand regardless of his mistakes on the track.

    1. double comment. my bad.

    2. “Way ahead” : side by side

      not sure about the fan part of your story. But when a cars rearwheel touches a part of another car about the location of the bargeboard, its not side by side ;)
      Maybe you should look again ( several times) to see VER was in front of HAM when they touched.
      The forcing off track happened when Lewis lost control of his car and forced VER off the track.
      its not so difficult when you open your eyes ;)

      1. man, don’t start. you said way ahead. Way ahead was Leclerc, not Verstappen.

        You’re wrong. Accept it peacefully.

  20. Lol of course horner will defend max, max is their golden pr boy. But I know even horner knows max drives too dirty and will be trying to help him learn how to drive fairly

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