The titanic battle between Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton, which seems to have really started this season, got off to a blazing start today. Verstappen’s wide racing line in Turn 4 cost him his first place, and in post-race interviews, both drivers provided text and explanations about the incident.
“For my part I don’t know why Mercedes could go wide in the beginning”, Verstappen starts during the F1 post race show on Youtube. “We are not allowed to do that in qualifying. Of course I was out of track limits when I passed Lewis so they told me to give the position back. It is what it is, it returned the position and then I tried again but I had run out of tires. I did have newer tires, but as soon as you come within 1.5 seconds they get worse very quickly, so it’s super difficult to follow them with these cars. ”
“It’s still a positive start to the season, and we still have a long season ahead of us. I see it as just seven stolen points and we’ll try to do better next time ”, says Verstappen.
Hamilton takes a different view
Hamilton also shares his perspective in an interview during the post race show. He emphasizes the difficulty with which he managed to keep Verstappen at bay. “I had a hard time, of course. We stopped so early, much shorter than our original strategy. Even with our original strategy it would be difficult to keep him behind, but he went on for so much longer and had much fresher tires. ”
The Briton continues: “We knew from this weekend and during testing that we would start from behind. When Verstappen was chasing me, I knew he was going to overtake me. In my head I thought: if I can keep these tires, make no mistakes, then I might keep him at arm’s length, outside of my DRS. ”
