Verstappen blames race control for ‘creating own problems’ in restart chaos
The reigning world champion won Sunday’s triple red-flagged race which ended in bizarre fashion to increase his early championship lead over Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez.
- Verstappen beats Hamilton to win chaotic Australian GP
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Kevin Magnussen’s crash with four laps to go prompted a decision to red flag the race and set up a two-lap sprint to the finish. Mayhem at the restart resulted in yet another suspension, before the race eventually ended with one lap behind the Safety Car.
Verstappen described the conclusion in Melbourne as a “mess” and accused race control of bringing the chaos on themselves.
“I think it's quite clear, I just didn't understand why we needed a red flag,” the Red Bull driver said.
“I think if you would have had a Safety Car and then just had a normal rolling start we wouldn't have had all these shunts and then you have a normal finish.
“So they created the problems themselves at the end of the day.”
Verstappen felt the incident could have covered by a Virtual Safety Car or Safety Car and expects the subject to be brought up ahead of the next race in Baku.
"I think that could have been done with a Virtual Safety Car or a Safety Car at worst,” he said. “But yeah, we'll talk about it. I think it left a lot of drivers confused, why we needed a red flag.”
Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso, who benefitted from the red flag to finish third after seemingly being taken out at the final restart, admitted he was “surprised” by the decision.
“I think the FIA has more information than us. So if there is a red flag, it has to be for a reason,” the Spaniard added.
“The FIA are the only ones that have all the cards on the table so in those kinds of situations, we trust them, and we try to keep them going.”
Mercedes driver George Russell said the first red flag was “totally unnecessary” - though it is worth noting he lost out as a result of it.
“I don’t really know what’s going on with some of the decisions,” the director of the Grand Prix Drivers’ Association (GPDA) said.
“We are all trying to work together with the FIA to improve things but it is a bit of a challenge.”
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