LEWIS HAMILTON blasted his Mercedes team and accused them of making “the biggest f*** up” as he was denied a shot at winning the Dutch GP.
A late safety car when Valtteri Bottas conked out turned this excellent race on its head as Hamilton stayed out on track while Max Verstappen pitted from the lead.
It promoted the Brit to first place but Mercedes failed to call him in for fresh tyres – unlike teammate George Russell.
There were parallels of that ill-fated race in Abu Dhabi last December as when the race restarted, he was a sitting duck.
Verstappen powered past the helpless Mercedes man, who vented his frustration over the radio.
He said: “That was the biggest f*** up. I can’t believe you guys screwed me.
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“I can’t tell you how p***** I am. I can’t believe how much you guys f***ed me”.
Hamilton came home in fourth place behind Russell and Charles Leclec who finished in second and third place respectively.
Verstappen’s home win – his fourth in a row and 10th of the season – means he has a whopping 109 points lead over Leclerc.
But just how Merc stuffed Hamilton up will take some unpicking as questions will again resurface about whether he intends to remain in the team.
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Verstappen said: “It was not a straightforward race. We had to push and with the safety cars it was important to make the right calls.
“Before that safety car I thought I was OK to the end, but when it came out I didn’t think we could keep it up if we didn’t pit.
“But I had a good run at the restart and into turn one. We timed it really well into the banking and got the draft right and got it done.
“It is always special to win your home GP. I had to work for it even more but a great weekend.”
Russell who was second said: “As a team, we showed incredible pace and not what we hoped for.
“But we can take a lot of confidence moving forward and we are slowly getting closer to that top step and hope we can catch them.”
Source: Motorsport - thesun.co.uk
