“There was nothing malicious about it” – George Russell asserts his compatriot Lewis Hamilton is one of the cleanest drivers on the grid after his opening lap crash with Max Verstappen at Silverstone.
There have been countless debates on whether Lewis Hamilton was responsible for crashing out Max Verstappen on the opening lap of the British Grand Prix at Silverstone.
George Russell, Hamilton’s potential Mercedes teammate next season, feels it was a racing incident, and rightly so. He adds that his compatriot is one of the fairest drivers on the grid, and would not use unfair means for his advantage.
“I watched the incident 100 times like everyone else.
“For me it was a racing accident. There was nothing malicious about it. Lewis is one of the cleanest and fairest drivers around.”
Despite being P2 in the Drivers’ Championship, Max Verstappen has led the most laps so far this season (403).
Lewis Hamilton has only led 128 laps compared to the Dutchman #F1 pic.twitter.com/0vwMhfKcJ6
— PlanetF1 (@Planet_F1) August 13, 2021
George Russell does detailed race review
The primary reason Russell happened to watch the crash highlights so many times is that he was doing a self-review of his race. He admits he did not realize what had happened while he was on the track, as it is very easy for drivers to miss out on such incidents at ultra-high speeds.
“I always watch my videos, check the data, and look for highlights. Just to understand what was going on.
“When you run your own race, you don’t know what is going to happen.
“When I drove around Copse, I didn’t even see Max in the tyre wall. I didn’t know that Sebastian had turned the corner before. I drove past him, saw the yellow flag, some dust in the air.
“When I checked the data afterwards, I noticed that it was Vettel who had turned up three positions in front of me. That was interesting.
“You are so focused on your job that you sometimes miss out on clear things.”
