“Well Deserved”: Kevin Magnussen Takes Ownership as Crimes Against Lewis Hamilton Bite Back

Desperation seemed to creep into Kevin Magnussen during the Miami GP Sprint Race as the Danish racing ace collected two 10-second time penalties and one five-second penalty for his multiple incidents with Lewis Hamilton. The Haas driver exceeded track limits on various occasions in a bid to keep the seven-time world champion at bay. This also earned him a black-and-white flag for driving standards.

At one point, he returned to the track in an unsafe manner and made contact with the Briton’s W15 as a result. In the aftermath of the Sprint Race, however, Magnussen admitted that the penalties that were dished out by the Stewards were “well deserved”. 

Formula1.com quoted him as saying, “All the penalties were well deserved, no doubt about it but I had to play the game again. I was vulnerable with Lewis. I had to create the gap like in Jeddah with these crazy tactics, which I don’t like doing but I played the team game. Not the way I like to go racing at all.”

“I think that’s pretty honest of him and I think that’s pretty cool.”

Lewis Hamilton on Kevin Magnussen’s aggressive defensive driving and admission he had to do it for the good of his Haas team’s result. pic.twitter.com/ba7uyDxA17

— Sky Sports F1 (@SkySportsF1) May 4, 2024

The #20 driver’s first infraction was cutting the chicane. In the laps afterwards, Magnussen was guilty of violating track limits on multiple occasions. The Danish driver then blamed his teammate, Nico Hulkenberg, who did not drop back to help him defend from Lewis Hamilton with DRS.

Lewis Hamilton failed to score points despite passing Kevin Magnussen

Although Lewis Hamilton eventually did manage to pass Kevin Magnussen and cross the line in P8 during the sprint race, his post-race penalty resulted in him failing to score any points. The Briton received a drive-through penalty (converted into a 20-second time penalty post-race) for an earlier incident of speeding in the pitlane.

As a result, he dropped to 16th despite crossing the line in eighth. While neither Hamilton nor Magnussen scored any points, they did provide some entertainment for the fans. During one instance, Magnussen’s Haas made contact with Hamilton’s Mercedes, a collision that allowed Yuki Tsunoda to get past both of them.

LAP 15 / 19

Magnussen goes off, delaying Hamilton and Tsunoda pounces to take what will eventually become P8! #F1Sprint #MiamiGP pic.twitter.com/n3FX3Z5iEe

— Formula 1 (@F1) May 4, 2024

Although Hamilton managed to get past the Japanese driver again to reach the final points-scoring position, his efforts went in vain after the stewards gave him the penalty. Because of the same, it was Tsunoda who scored the final point.