Max Verstappen expects Lewis Hamilton will be penalised for the incident between the pair during qualifying.
However he said the Ferrari driver was not to blame for holding him up at Massenet when the pair encountered each other during Q1.
Verstappen backed off when he came across Hamilton on the inside of the corner as he turned in. “Massive impeding, that,” he told race engineer Gianpiero Lambiase on his radio.
Prior to the incident, Hamilton’s race engineer Riccardo Adami first warned him Verstappen was approaching, then told him he had slowed down. Verstappen said the error was therefore not Hamilton’s fault.
“Of course at the time you see the car blocking you and when you’re there at high speed, it’s not nice,” he told Sky. “But then I saw immediately that the team told him that I was driving slow, while I was clearly driving fast.
“So it’s not Lewis’s fault. I quickly chatted to Lewis already about it. It’s very simple, but of course it can’t happen. But that’s the team’s mistake.”
However Verstappen said past precedent for how stewards have handled similar incidents shows Hamilton should get a penalty.
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“If you look at the history of things, yes, but again, it’s more the team’s fault,” he said. “But unfortunately in qualifying, of course, they normally are quite strict on these things.”
Hamilton qualified fourth, one place ahead of Verstappen. He said he began to pick up his speed after he was told Verstappen was not on a flying lap behind him.
“I think I was doing a good job of staying out of the way of everyone,” said Hamilton. “But the team said that Max was on a fast lap, so I was to the left, but then they said he was not on a fast lap.
“So I was just about to get back on the power, I accelerated for 10 metres or something. I was off the line but for sure distracted him.”
The pair were summoned to see the stewards after qualifying.
This article will be updated
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