Lewis Hamilton expressed his lack of major concern regarding the penalty that resulted in his drop from fourth to seventh place in today’s sprint race.
The 38-year-old received a five-second time penalty for colliding with Sergio Perez, with the stewards deeming it an unnecessary collision.
Although Hamilton originally finished the race in fourth place, the penalty led to him being placed seventh. Despite the outcome, Hamilton remained mostly unfazed by the stewards’ decision.
“In a race like today, I don’t really care too much,” he said. “You don’t get many points.“Of course it would have been nice to finish fourth. But I don’t really care to finish fourth, I want to win. Fourth, seventh, it doesn’t really make a difference.”
The stewards determined that Hamilton bore primary responsibility for the collision, stating that he was “predominantly at fault.”
They observed that while Perez had provided limited space on the inside for Hamilton, the latter drove onto the kerb and subsequently understeered into Perez, given the challenging wet conditions.
As a result of their assessment, the stewards attributed Hamilton with causing the collision and imposed a five-second penalty accordingly.
In addition to the five-second time penalty, Hamilton received two penalty points on his license due to the collision. Despite the outcome, Hamilton expressed his belief that the incident was a racing incident.
“It’s tricky conditions out there, we’re all trying to do our best,” he said. “Of course it wasn’t intentional.
“I went for a gap, he was slow going through 14, I went up the inside, I was more than half a car length inside. And if you don’t go for a gap then you’re no longer racing as Ayrton always said. So that’s what I did. When I watched it back, it feels like a racing incident to me.”
