Nico Hulkenberg claims Charles Leclerc was “impatient” and “too aggressive” after their collision during the Monaco Grand Prix.
The Ferrari driver was on a mission to recover from his lowly grid position of P15 and had already passed Lando Norris and Romain Grosjean with bold moves.
When it came to Hulkenberg, however, Leclerc showed some inexperience as he hit the barrier and the Renault trying to repeat the move at Rascasse that he had on the Haas a few laps earlier.
“Charles was too aggressive. He came quite far back and I didn’t leave much of a gap anyway,” he surmised.
“Then I saw that he launched and I tried to play fair. I opened the steering and tried to leave him some space and let us both live. He spun on his own axis and that kissed my car.
“I didn’t hit the wall but it sliced my rear tyre open and that’s where it all went too wrong. He was just too ambitious.”
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The German, who went on to finish 14th, admits he was expecting a move from the Monegasque but questioned his judgement.
“My race engineer told me that he had passed Grosjean the lap before, and I could sense his move coming,” Hulkenberg said. “But you have to weigh up your chances as a driver and know when it’s a real opportunity or not.
“I think he was impatient today, frustrated from yesterday and he wanted to get through the field. That’s Monaco, it doesn’t work like that.”
Leclerc also picked up a puncture having hit the apex barrier with the damage forcing him to retire from his home race for the second straight year.
