F1: Coulthard, Webber pin blame on Lewis Hamilton for Verstappen crash

Lewis Hamilton has been branded “disrespectful and unsportsmanlike” by furious Max Verstappen. His team boss Christian Horner agreed

“Max has incurred a 51g accident. Lewis Hamilton is an eight-time world champion, he shouldn’t be making maneuvers like that. It’s unacceptable.

“Thank goodness, the biggest result for us today is that he’s uninjured, he’s having to go to hospital for [precautionary checks.

“I hope Lewis is very happy with himself.

Lewis Hamilton went dancing around with his fans after the race after putting Verstappen in the hospital

“He stuck a wheel up the inside in a corner you just know you don’t do that. You just don’t stick a wheel up the inside at Copse, in that corner, in those circumstances.

“He was nowhere near ahead, it was contact, left front to right rear, and the speed they’re travelling, It’s one of the fastest corners in the championship.

“Lewis has got more than enough experience to know that’s unacceptable and, as I say, I”m just very disappointed that a driver of his caliber should make such a move.

“It’s dangerous, he’s put a competitor at risk, it looked desperate and thank goodness uninjured, he’s in hospital getting himself checked out.

What was Hamilton doing up in the middle of the track when Verstappen gave him more than a full lane down the inside? Because Hamilton was trying to run Verstappen wide and off the track just like he did late in the race to Leclerc, who yielded like a good puppy dog. Hamilton has always raced this way – extremely aggressive.

July 18, 2021

The gloves are off!

Max Verstappen tweeted from the hospital and puts the blame for the crash squarely on Hamilton

Glad I’m ok. Very disappointed with being taken out like this. The penalty given does not help us and doesn’t do justice to the dangerous move Lewis made on track. Watching the celebrations while still in hospital is disrespectful and unsportsmanlike behavior but we move on pic.twitter.com/iCrgyYWYkm

— Max Verstappen (@Max33Verstappen) July 18, 2021

July 18, 2021

David Coulthard and Mark Webber both felt Lewis Hamilton was at fault for his opening-lap crash with Max Verstappen.

“I was ahead going in there. It was my line. He turned in on me,” Hamilton told his Mercedes team.

Ex-F1 driver Coulthard did not agree though, believing it was Hamilton who had to yield.

“He has picked up the slipstream, there’s enough space there, Max has opened it, he has given him space but then the speed they’re both carrying into the corner, that has to be Hamilton,” he said during Channel 4’s coverage of the British Grand Prix.

“He has got to take responsibility for that because Max left him the space.

“We know that’s not really a corner where you are going to overtake unless you’ve absolutely got it down the inside. Lewis knows, up against Max Verstappen, you have to leave your car there and see what happens.

“This is a battle for the ages, this is Senna against Prost, this is Mansell against Piquet, it was always going to happen. Thankfully, when it has, nobody has been injured.”

Mark Webber, agreed Hamilton was at fault, branding the overtake attempt as “clumsy” and “tremendously optimistic”.

Hamilton hits Verstappen and breaks his right-rear wheel

“I think we can count, on one hand, not too many occasions where Lewis Hamilton has been involved in something relatively controversial,” he said.

“Yes with Nico Rosberg, but this guy, I don’t think he will be proud of that move, he won’t be happy with it. He would have liked to have had that opportunity and that moment again to pull out of that move because it was Max’s corner right at the last minute.

“It was a tremendously optimistic location to pull a move off like that. A bit clumsy from Lewis.”

Hamilton was hit with a slap-on-the-wrist 10-second time penalty by the stewards, but still went on to complete a sensational comeback win in front of his home crowd.