F1 News
Date: 27/August/2011
F1 rookie Pastor Maldonado has been penalized, and former world champion Lewis Hamilton reprimanded, after a bizarre collision after the end of qualifying two at Spa-Francorchamps, Belgium, on Saturday.
Hamilton, desperate to complete his final flying lap in order to make the cut for Q3, had barged past the Williams driver moments earlier, during a log-jam at the final chicane.
With the session over, Hamilton then backed off and Maldonado drew alongside on the exit of turn one. The Columbian was half a car-length in front when he seemed to turn across the McLaren driver, in what some felt was an act of revenge for the earlier contact.
The impact left Hamilton limping back to the pits with bodywork and suspension damage, while Maldonado was sent swerving off-track before being forced to park his car.
Hamilton said: "As I was coming through the exit of turn one I saw Maldonado approaching quite quickly. He came around me and I didn’t move anywhere, but he happened to swipe across me.
"I think it was quite serious and quite fortunate that neither of us - and particularly him - was flipped or had a big, big crash. We were quite lucky.
"Once the flag is out and the red lights are on there is no need to be racing and there should never ever be an incident.
"I don’t know whether it was intentional or not. I guess we will see shortly," added Hamilton, referring to the inevitable investigation.
The FIA Stewards declared both drivers had contributed to the incident, but that Maldonado was more to blame.
Maldonado was thus handed a five-place penalty for Sunday's race, dropping him from 16th to 21st on the grid, while Hamilton was reprimanded, but received no penalty.
Maldonado claimed he was unaware of what caused the incident.
He said: "Lewis slowed down a lot at the end of the session, so I tried to go past him. I then felt contact at the back of my car. I don’t really know what happened."
Frantic repairs in the McLaren pits allowed Hamilton to return for the final part of qualifying, where he took second on the grid behind Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel.
Hamilton explained: "The front wing was quite badly damaged – my sidepod, and I thought my front suspension was damaged. I think the front toe-in is probably a little bit out, but fortunately the guys did a great job to put it back together.
"The fortunate thing is that we were therefore able to complete the final session. Most importantly, too, we’re in a great position to fight for the race win tomorrow.”
Hamilton and Maldonado had previously clashed at Monaco, when a clumsy pass by Hamilton knocked the reigning GP2 champion out of the race. Hamilton received a 20-second penalty for the collision.
No comments:
Post a Comment