For me, Lewis is mostly at fault, but they both share the blame (I'd say it's 60-40%). Lewis most definitely didn't crash into Max on purpose, as some have implied. The 10s penalty probably means the stewards reached a similar conclusion.
I believe Max is just used to getting his way, bullying other drivers with his aggressive style. He tried to force Lewis to back down, the same way he's done all season. His gamble just didn't pay off this time. But ultimately, it was just a racing incident
I watched the first lap live on Leclerc's on board camera and he got a perfect view of all the action in front of him. Years ago, it was a racing incident with no consequences. Nowadays, it's an automatic 5 second penalty minimum. The severity of the impact is probably why it was 10 seconds.
I was dismayed that Lewis got a penalty. That was a racing incident if there ever was one. There's an arrogance to Max's racing that I love. I love that he will not give an inch and his do or die wheel to wheel racing. But eventually, there will be one occasion where the opposite driver will refuse to pull out. You can't always expect to take a corner pretending that your opponent isn't there. He knew Lewis was going to be there yet still took it. If anything the blame lies with him.
The sprint quali? Jury remains out on that but No harm in having it two or three times a season, but no need to replace our current quali format. Why? Because as Friday showed, that format is utterly perfect.
It's perfect for you when Hamilton gets it. There's nothing wrong with the format itself, it's the lack of competitive action on a Friday that is the main issue. To solve that, they brought in sprint qualifying. Unless a better solution can be found, I think it's going to be permanent from next year. Provisional pole after qualifying, pole position after the sprint. Sprint races are already routine in other formulas during the race weekend, even in Monaco. Now they've come to Formula 1.
A racing incident means either both drivers are equally responsible for it or neither are. It's no defence for a driver to argue he won't back down. You have no right to put yourself, other drivers, marshalls, or fans at risk, as well as damage your own car, just to make sure you win your home race, and that is what it was all about imo. He just couldn't accept losing his home race in front of his home fans, so when he couldn't overtake him cleanly, he launched a desperate now or never move against a fellow driver and took him out. In our sport it would be deemed a professional foul. The stewards gave him the automatic penalty that goes with it, and added another 5 seconds on top of it. He was lucky he didn't get points on his licence as well, because other drivers have for less.
Usually when a driver has been taken to hospital, the winner drives the race distance, gets out of the car asap, and your first priority is to find out how he is. Not Hamilton though, he had flags to wave and engineers to congratulate first. He later refused to apologise either, just blamed Verstappen for being too aggressive. Of course Verstappen is aggressive, he hasn't got as far as he has by just letting drivers past him, and he won't change nor should he. If he did, he would become as slow as Jos Verstappen used to be.
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