Nico Hulkenberg was surprisingly unbothered by his collision with Daniil Kvyat at the end of the Mexican Grand Prix.
The German was running ninth on the final lap when the Russian tried an audacious move exiting the stadium which punted Hulkenberg into the barrier.
“The last lap was just racing with Dany,” he told Formula1.com. “Obviously he did push me into the wall, I left significant space on the inside.
“He’s trying, which you have to do as a racing driver. It was just one of those things in racing.”
Having initially dropped out of the points because of the clash, the Renault was at least promoted to 10th when Kvyat got a 10-second penalty for the incident.
But that wasn’t really of much interest to Hulkenberg who was left disappointed by his race.
“P9 also wasn’t that great, to be honest,” he admitted.
“Strategy wise we didn’t nail it, stopped too early, we were too keen. Then the second stint was really long and difficult in the end with tyres that were dying on me.”
As for Kvyat, however, he was livid with the decision from the stewards.
“I’m quite upset, I disagree with it because we are told we are allowed to race,” he said.
FIA race director Michael Masi quickly shut down the Toro Rosso driver though.
“From having had a chat to the stewards it could not have been more clear,” he said. “I think there was, to use the terminology, in their view, [it] could not have been more black and white.”