Max Verstappen: I didn’t move while braking

Max Verstappen could have won the Austrian Grand Prix, but on lap 64 he defended too aggressively against Lando Norris in turn three and a collision occurred between the drivers.

The stewards deemed Max guilty of the incident, imposed a ten-second penalty on him and gave him two penalty points. As a result, the reigning world champion finished fifth and after the race he dismissed all accusations that he shifted gears while braking and therefore caused the collision.

Max’s teammate Sergio Perez finished seventh.

Max Verstappen (5th): “I think a ten-second time penalty is too much because I don’t feel like I was too aggressive in any way.

I didn’t shift while braking, because I normally don’t brake when shifting. Of course, everything may look different from the outside, but it seems to me that I know better how to act in such situations.

Furthermore, some of Norris’s moves resembled bombing, where he went in and hoped the other man would let him through. It’s not a good thing when you fight like that, but I think the rotation configuration helps with that too. I sat in his place and I can say that this is just such a feature of the bend.

I didn’t expect the maneuver we performed together. I saw Lando coming, so I defended myself a little inside. While braking, our rear wheels touched each other and we both got a flat tire. Of course, you never want this to happen.

When I said bombing, I meant the opponent drives to the end hoping the second man will back off so he can turn. But that didn’t happen. I like to do that too: sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. It didn’t work today, but our collision was the result of a very unfortunate set of circumstances.

Lando and I will talk about this, but not now. Now is not the right time. But you know, he and I are racers. Lando and I have a little age difference, so he and I have never raced against each other in the lower series. But hey, let’s leave this in the past.”

Sergio Perez (7th): “I’m very disappointed with today’s final position. The race started really well, I had a great start and then the car got damaged on the first lap. This caused her to take turns sliding, and it was difficult for me to move forward.

The damage left me almost without balance and I made a mistake entering the pit lane, which resulted in a 5-second time penalty, which only hindered me closer to the finish.

There are several things that my team and I need to analyze carefully. Overall we didn’t have enough speed, the race was difficult and I had a lot of problems.

“I hope we can be strong next weekend, that we can get a good result and solve all the problems that we have encountered at this stage. There are still many races to go and we have to move on. Silverstone is ahead.”