Max Verstappen appeared to admit that he deliberately crashed into Formula 1 rival George Russell in the final laps of the Spanish Grand Prix.
Oscar Piastri took victory at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya on Sunday, extending his championship lead over McLaren teammate Lando Norris and Verstappen.
The four-time champion was in contention to win but a mistake on the safety car restart saw him lose out to Charles Leclerc before he collided with Russell and took to the escape road at turn one.
Red Bull told an irate Verstappen to let Russell overtake him, feeling he had gained an advantageous but cutting the corner and duly pulled aside to let the Mercedes driver overtake him.
But suddenly, Verstappen slammed into the side of Russell, in a clear act of retaliation before eventually letting his rival past.
The Dutchman eventually crossed the line in fifth but was slapped with a 10-second penalty, dropping him down to 10th and costing him crucial points in the title race.
After the race, Verstappen was later filmed storming through parc ferme and was in a bullish mood in the media pen, but appeared to confess to hitting Russell deliberately.
Max Verstappen and George Russell break silence on crash
Asked by Sky Sports whether the contact was intentional, the 27-year-old angrily replied: ‘Does it matter?’
Pushed again for an answer, he responded: ‘Yeah, okay. That’s great,’ before ruling himself out of the title race.
‘I prefer to speak about the race rather than one single moment.
‘If there are any [championship hopes]. I think we are way too slow to fight for the title. That was clear again today.’
Russell himself was left baffled as to Verstappen’s actions, accusing his fierce rival of ‘letting himself down’.
‘I was as surprised as you guys were. I’ve seen those sort of manoeuvres before on simulator games and go-karting but never in F1,’ he told Sky Sports.
Spanish Grand Prix result
- Piastri – 25pts
- Norris – 18pts
- Leclerc – 15pts
- Russell – 12pts
- Hulkenberg – 10pts
- Hamilton – 8pts
- Hadjar – 6pts
- Gasly – 4pts
- Alonso – 2pts
- Verstappen – 1pts
‘Ultimately we came home in P4 and he came home in P10. I don’t really know what was going through his mind. It felt deliberate in the moment, so it felt surprising.
‘Max is such an amazing driver and so many people look up to him. It’s just a shame something like that continues to occur. It seems totally unnecessary and never seems to benefit himself.’
Lando Norris’ hilarious reaction to Verstappen and Russell’s crash
Norris, as ever, managed to see the funny side of the shocking crash as he reacted to the incident in the cool down room alongside Piastri and Leclerc.
As the podium finishers watched the race highlights, they were stunned into silence by the collision before Norris turned to the others and said: ‘I’ve done that before… on Mario Kart!’
Norris later approached Russell in the media pen, asking: ‘Was that you and Max together? It was?’
He then jokingly added: ‘I can’t believe you turned in on him like that! That was crazy! George should have got a penalty, it was clear!’
But when asked about the crash and the ‘Mario Kart’ comment, a sheepish Norris, replied: ‘Oh you heard that. Right… No comment’
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