Red Bull Team Principal Christian Horner redoubled his criticism of Lewis Hamilton after his collision with Max Verstappen at the British Grand Prix.
Hamilton and Verstappen came to blows on the opening lap at Silverstone through Copse corner as they contested the lead of the race.
Verstappen suffered a sizeable impact, measured at 51G, and was taken to hospital for checks as a precaution.
Hamilton was handed a 10-second time penalty, having been deemed predominantly to blame, and he recovered from fourth to claim victory at Silverstone for a record eighth time.
Horner heaped criticism on Hamilton in the immediate aftermath of the contact and continued to hit out at the Mercedes driver when speaking with written media after the race.
“If you look at the overhead he’s run wide into the corner,” said Horner.
“He’s carried too much speed. That move was never on. Lewis is a world champion of seven titles. That was an amateur’s mistake and a desperate mistake.
“I can’t see how Lewis can take any satisfaction from a win when he’s put his fellow driver in hospital.
“It’s disappointing, it’s extremely annoying. His actions have put in jeopardy another driver’s safety and for me that’s unacceptable.
“[He was] lucky not to have the same crash with [Charles] Leclerc – if Leclerc hadn’t run wide and taken the line he’s entitled to then the same incident would have prevailed.”
Horner added that Verstappen has “been through all the precautionary scans and retained consciousness at all times.
“He is battered, he is bruised, it is the biggest accident of his career, a 51g incident.
“I’m just grateful that it is not worse than that, that he was able to get out of the car and walk away as it was an enormous accident.”
Horner is bang on. Hamilton is a dirty driver and Red Bull should pursue this until proper punishment is administered.
Shame on you Hamilton! That was a novice move that could have been Fatal. BTW, Mercedes should reimburse Red Bull $1.5MM for the damaged car.
Hamilton is now at all-time desperate low. He is a really poor loser and in general has made F1 very unpleasant to watch. The sooner he retires, the sooner F1 can become enjoyable to watch again. It’s a shame McLaren never made much of an to retain him for 2013 when his career was already fizzing out, or he probably would have retired by the end of 2015, and definitely would have never won a race or championship again. If I were Russell, I would be running away screaming from Mercedes, because mark my words – if he goes there and has Hamilton as his teammate, Hamilton will try to sabotage his career.
You’re being silly.
These F1 cars are so fragile in some ways. They’re technological wonders so long as they operate in their optimum environment, but even a minor tap from another car can totally disturb them. We’ve seen bumps result in no damage at all to total destruction like today. This was a racing incident between the two best drivers of the past ten or more years, with the champ holding steady while the challenger danced around him.
Hamilton has to show he’s still in the game, still the champ. Remember Rosberg saying he beat Hamilton by getting into his head, not by outdriving him? Hamilton has to defend against that. Today he succeeded and, instead, got into Verstappen’s head.
Neither of them are angels and have form. All up, its making for a spicy 2nd half to the championship!
This title is intellectually dishonest. CH said “that was an amateur’s mistake and a desperate mistake”, which is really quite different to “LH was a desperate amateur”. I see this as a sign of amateur journalism and/or desperation for clicks.