Sir Lewis Hamilton escaped with just a warning from the stewards after Carlos Sainz slammed him for ‘super dangerous’ driving in Saudi Arabia.
After an underwhelming race at the season opener in Bahrain, Hamilton and Mercedes are looking to bounce back in Jeddah this weekend.
Things aren’t going to plan so far for the seven-time Formula 1 champion, who finished eighth in both of Thursday’s practice sessions, some distance behind Max Verstappen and Fernando Alonso who set the fastest times.
But that wasn’t the British driver’s only concern, after he was summoned to the race stewards after nearly causing a big crash in FP2.
Hamilton was on a slow lap when Sainz’s Ferrari approached from behind, before Williams’ Logan Sargeant, on a flying lap, arrived at the same part of the track.
With Hamilton in the way, Sargeant was forced to take evasive action to avoid a huge crash, going off the road on the high-speed street circuit, with the American furiously venting over the radio: ‘Mate! Come on! It’s too dangerous.’
Sainz echoed his sentiment, saying: ‘What Hamilton did there was super dangerous. Like he was in the middle.
‘I couldn’t get out of the way. Sargeant nearly crashed because of him.’
For his part, Hamilton said: ‘I didn’t realise someone was on a lap. I was trying to get out of the way for Sainz and all of a sudden there was a Williams there.’
Such incidents can lead to a grid penalty for the impeding driver, but the stewards deemed Mercedes themselves were to blame for the near-miss, stating: ‘Having listened to the team radio, it was clear to us that the team of Car 44 [Hamilton] failed to warn their driver of the fact that Car 2 [Sargeant] was arriving on a fast lap.
‘That was a serious failure on the part of the team, particularly given the speeds on this circuit and the nature of turn 11, which is at the end of a series of high speed corners where driver visibility is impaired.
‘We therefore issue a warning to the driver and impose a fine of €15,000 (£12,800) to the team.’
‘Difficult day. Just lacking the confidence in the rear of the car,’ Hamilton later told Sky Sports.
‘In the set-up we did some work, changed the car quite a bit, but underlying issue with the rear end that I’m struggling with, so I had a couple of really big moments out there.
‘In those high-speed areas you need to have full faith in the car and I’ve just not got that yet. All I want is a stable rear and then I’ll be happy!’
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