Max Verstappen finished third in the sprint in Baku on Saturday, but made no secret of his displeasure at George Russell’s first lap performance, which damaged the two-time world champion’s car.
After the race, he approached the British Mercedes driver to discuss the incident, and at the end of their exchange about what had happened, uttered the following phrase: “Expect the same thing next time.”
“I mean exactly what I said,” Max replied when asked on Sky Sports to explain what those words mean. – I have a lot of respect for all riders, but you have to use your common sense and think about how you act on the first lap. Why take so much risk? Mercedes is inferior to us in terms of speed and after a few laps I would have overtaken Russell anyway. In addition, he could also damage his car, and not just mine.
There was a hole in the side pontoon of my RB19, but he could get a flat tire and the race would be over for him. In my opinion I acted correctly in the 2nd corner, left him one place, and he locked the wheels, after which he tried to explain that he had cold tyres. But we’ve all had cold tyres, so that’s no excuse.
I don’t like it when people act like that and claim they didn’t do anything wrong. But as it is, so it is. It wasn’t me who overtook Russell, but he was trying to get ahead of me and I was just trying to avoid trouble. In general, we have different views on this incident.”
Source: F1 News
I am Christopher Clyde, an experienced journalist and content writer with a passion for sports. I have been writing about Formula 1 news for the past five years and am currently employed as an author at athletistic.com, one of the top sports websites in the US.
