Sergio Perez has blamed Hamilton for the significant damage his car sustained as a result of the collision during the Belgian Grand Prix sprint race.
While attempting to overtake his rival through Curbe Paul Frere, Hamilton made contact with Perez, resulting in damage to the right-hand sidepod of Perez’s car.
“It was massive damage from the contact from Lewis,” said Perez. “He just took the whole right hand side off the car.
“He damaged the floor and the sidepod, so that that was game over – we lost too much grip with it.”
Following the contact with Hamilton, Perez faced difficulties maintaining grip on the track, causing him to be overtaken by the Ferrari drivers. Eventually, at Stavelot, he spun off due to the challenging conditions.
Earlier in the race, Perez had managed to gain some positions, leading him to believe that he had the opportunity to further improve his standing.
“It was looking great,” he said. “The team did a great strategy to recover, we were about to get Gasly just before the Safety Car came out. So, it was looking great but unfortunately it was just all too late.”
“I think he was in a bit of a hurry,” Perez added. “Everyone was in a hurry to recover today, it’s a very short race, you have to take those level of risks, but not nice to get my race ruined by him.”
Red Bull made the decision to retire Perez’s car after he fell to nineteenth on the grid. As for the collision incident, the stewards deemed Hamilton to be at fault and imposed a five-second time penalty on him. This penalty caused Hamilton’s position to drop from fourth to seventh place in the final standings.
