Lewis Hamilton has been given a five-second penalty for causing the collision with Alex Albon late on at the Brazilian Grand Prix.
After losing out by not pitting under the first Safety Car period, caused by his teammate Valtteri Bottas’ engine failure, the Briton would stop for soft tyres during the second, following the clash between the two Ferrari’s.
That gave Hamilton a handful of laps to try and claim the victory but would misjudge a move into the Bico de Pato hairpin, colliding with the Red Bull at the apex.
“I massively apologise to Albon,” the world champion said in parc ferme after denying the Thai his first Formula 1 podium.
“I went for a move, the gap was kind of there, but obviously it closed at the end and completely my fault.”
The stewards agreed and handed a five-second penalty which drops him down to seventh and left Albon absolutely livid.
“Not too much [happened] really, obviously I saw there was gap exiting Turn 9 and I thought that was enough not to worry into Turn 10,” he said explaining the incident.
“I knew he had a little bit more grip so I went in just a little bit hotter just to not give him any ideas and yea, it was just one of those things.
“Once you commit, you can’t really see the spot where I am and its like ‘has he gone it, has he not?’ and yea, he has.”
As for his performance on the day, Alex added: “Yea, it was good, it was alright,” he smiled. “I’m a bit disappointed but yea.”
As for Hamilton though, it was a difficult race as his Mercedes didn’t couldn’t keep pace with the imperious winner Max Verstappen.
“Still a great race, Max did a fantastic job today and they just outclassed us in terms of overall performance and we couldn’t keep up with them on the straights,” he commented.
“But I raced my heart out, I gave it everything, I put everything on the table and I took a lot of risks today. We threw everything and the sink at it. I don’t think there’s anything we could do.”
