“I apologised to the team”, Hamilton said. Today everything went well.
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Verstappen, 18, drove like a veteran in fending off a late challenge by Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen, who not long ago raced against Verstappen’s father, former Benetton and Arrows driver Jos Verstappen.
Daniel Ricciardo and Valteri Bottas finished fourth and fifth respectively.
Rosberg, aiming to make it five successive wins for the season, passed Hamilton around the outside of turn one and the triple world champion was then squeezed on to the grass as he tried to regain the lead at turn three. This resulted in the second placed Mercedes colliding with the leading silver Arrows vehicle and taking both of them into the gravel with both cars suffering terminal damage.
Rosberg, who lost his first race of the season, said he is feeling extremely gutted not only for himself but also for his colleagues, saying that they deserved to win the race. “What a great debut”.
“Right now it’s the reverse situation of when he arrived (at Red Bull) and (Sebastian) Vettel was the driver, except Vettel had four world championships and he doesn’t”, Villeneuve said. “Lewis was too aggressive to pass him and why should Nico give him room?” He’s in the lead.
While Verstappen was completing a historic win, Hamilton and Rosberg were locked away in the Mercedes’ debrief truck with the team’s hierarchy of Toto Wolff, Paddy Lowe and Lauda, following one of the most stunning collisions in recent memory.
“I blame Lewis more than I blame Nico”.
“By continuing to let them race each other, it was clear that eventually this could happen”. In our opinion, there is not one to blame entirely. “Both Lewis and Nico are upset”.
“The stewards have said it is a racing incident, which we have to accept”, said Rosberg. He hasn’t won since the United States GP in October.
However, the collision ended Mercedes hopes of extending the team’s winning run to 11 races and equalling McLaren’s 1988 record streak of success.
“When you’re 17km/h faster and there’s a gap, you go for it. That’s what racing drivers do”.
“It was an incident that could have been avoided”, said Wolff, who declared also that Mercedes would continue to allow free racing between them. Hamilton was in pole position but was overtaken by team-mate Rosberg at the start.
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The incident brought the safety auto out on the track.
