Lando Norris accepted second place to Daniel Ricciardo after the collision between Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen at the Italian Grand Prix.
The Briton has been leading McLaren throughout 2021, but last Sunday found himself following his Australian teammate, who took the lead from Verstappen at the start in Monza.
With Sergio Perez and Valtteri Bottas right behind him, Norris did urge McLaren to tell Ricciardo to speed up or let him through at one point.
And he admits it was difficult to resist the racer’s urge to attack.
“I am not going to lie,” he told Sky Sports F1 in the paddock. “I could have tried. I asked the team what they wanted to do.
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“I think I had the pace to at least try. I can’t say if I would have got Daniel or not, but I could have tried at least.”
However: “It could have ended up like the other two ended up [Verstappen and Hamilton] so I’m just happy,” he added.
“I got a bit closer on one lap and I just kinda… I don’t know why… I had a few flashes seeing the incident between Max and Lewis.
“I saw it quite well in my mirrors, so when I thought maybe I’ll try, that was flashing up in my head and I thought ‘naaah, maybe this isn’t the wisest decision’!
“As much as inside I wanted to go for it, I was just as happy to stay in second because I’m a team guy, I love the team and I’ve grown up with them, in a way.
“This is the best result I could hope for,” he insisted. “I will get my chance in the future, so it’s all good.”
Throughout Saturday and the first stint on Sunday, Norris found himself battling Hamilton pretty much throughout.
“This was nice,” he said. “The longer we went [in the race] I knew it he was going to have an advantage [on the hard tyre].
“I think I had a good warm-up [on Saturday] with 18 laps trying to defend from him.
“I could figure him out quite quickly, where he was going to be strong and weak and so on.
“He got me in the end and then with the pitstop it got me out ahead of Max and Lewis and I could have been in that crash,” he noted. “It could have ended up how the other two ended up.”