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Hamilton later said he "wouldn't expect anything else", adding: "It was fun. This is what a world championship battle should look like."
But on arriving at the Qatar Grand Prix, he said: "The reason I would say that is that's the mentality you have to take.
"If you sit in the car in the moment and complain it will only hold you back. Also it's difficult to judge something you've not seen all the angles. We looked at it and I have a different viewpoint now, naturally."
The seven-time champion declined to elaborate.
Verstappen said: "I don't expect [any punishment] to happen because I thought it was hard and fair racing."
But he told 5 Live "it's not going to change the world" if he was penalised.
Verstappen told BBC 5 live in an exclusive interview: "It was not an 'incident'. We didn't touch. I was just trying to defend my position.
"We are both racers and we are fighting for the championship and I am not going to make it easy; the other way around it would have been exactly the same. That's why we were battling hard.
"I had fun. OK, I finished second and I'm not happy to finish second, but he was behind me, he was very fast, and I tried my best to keep him behind.
"You don't make it easy. He got by and they won the race and fair enough they just had a better race than us. I left there, it was a tough race but I enjoyed it."
Verstappen's move was controversial because the F1 rules say: "Manoeuvres liable to hinder other drivers, such as deliberate crowding of a car beyond the edge of the track or any other abnormal change of direction, are strictly prohibited."
Ferrari's Charles Leclerc said: "If this is allowed, then overtaking around the outside is going to be very difficult."
McLaren's Daniel Ricciardo said: "You know you are going to get raced hard with Max. But was that too hard? Who knows? I'm going to stay out of it. You could say it was too hard because both went off the track, neither made the corner."
Russell, who will join Mercedes next year as Hamilton’s team mate, told Sky: “Whether there’ll be a penalty for it retrospectively, I don’t know. Should there have been a penalty at the time? I believe they should have been.
“Because you can’t just break 25 metres later than you do on every other lap and force the other guy off the road. That’s not fair racing. It’s harder racing but it’s not fair racing.”
Noone can go beyond of what a car can give. It is physically impossible. You can say he squeezed everything out of his car and even that is not entirely true, due to the human nature and limitations.zibby43 wrote: ↑19 Nov 2021, 06:27Some more comments from LEC, who continues to be one of my favorite drivers on the grid.
https://twitter.com/planet_f1/status/14 ... 37092?s=21
What Lewis Hamilton did this weekend at Interlagos track was unprecedented, at least for me, who was or watched all the Brazilian Grand Prix at the José Carlos Pace Circuit, except for three or four. I even went in 1972 to the inaugural race that was not worth for the championship.
I didn't go in 1979 because I lived in the United States and in the two or three remaining because I was travelling outside of Brazil. But the times I didn't go to Interlagos when I was in Brazil, I watched it on TV.
I haven't seen anything like it at Interlagos in these 49 years. It started on Friday with FP1 and then a dominant qualifying, always being the fastest in every session without giving any chance to his opponents. He drove with a knife in his teeth every time he went on track, tested several racing lines, did the straights many times in practice without using DRS and tested lines and braking for the two most important corners of the track - the S of Senna and Junction - in every way. He saw very quickly that he couldn't enter these two key corners of the circuit 'sold', because he would lose on the next straight.
He also saw that in those curves he couldn't brake as he likes, inside, because he also lost in the two straights doing that. He found a way to help not to overheat the tyres by doing Pinheirinho on the outside in a way I've never seen anyone do.
But he was disqualified. 0.2 millimeters on one side of his DRS were beyond the allowed, while the other side was right. His DRS was "crooked", which definitely didn't help him at all, but it did break the regulations.
Mercedes knew about the disqualification on Friday night itself, although it was not announced until Saturday. The suspense is part of F1's marketing. Almost everything is decided long before it is made public, but I am lucky enough to have a friend inside the Mercedes team, Dude, who told me the following:
"Adawtow, we knew the man would be disqualified early on Friday night. Of course it was a DRS fitting error, a legitimate 0.2 millimetre error that didn't help but hindered the man, because the wing when it opened was crooked by 0.2 millimetres."
"The FIA knows that, the opponents know that, but the regulations are clear, even though they are badly written. The possibility was mooted that we could appeal and run on Saturday starting from pole under protest. We all wanted to do that, but two people didn't; Wolff and the man himself."
"The man interrupted the discussion by asking, 'Can I use full power in the sprint race all the time?'
"Then Shovlin said: 'You can, but the rear tyres won't cope with that, you're already running less downforce at the rear' So Bono suggested that if we weren't going to run under protest, that would be our best chance."
"From there the man, looking at Wolff, said that's what we should do, he would make sure the tyres would hold up by driving round mainly from 5 (Orange) to 12 (Junction). Then Wolff asked us all, 'Why not'?"
"At that point I would say the man decided he would run 24 qualifying laps in the short race on Saturday. But for Sunday, Wolff called the factory and asked for new simulations for PU considering that strategy. Less than 1 hour later the simulations arrived and we started studying the three most risky and the three least."
Then, on Saturday, the fans at Interlagos and the millions watching on TV witnessed the mind-boggling 24 laps of qualifying without a single mistake from Hamilton, who pulled off an impressive 15 overtakes and still had the tyre for half a dozen more laps.
"He came in ecstatic after the (sprint) race, he said he couldn't remember feeling like that before. Even so he was calm, focused, he said he learned all the ways of the track, it was like Silverstone, a track where he has been about 50 times more than Interlagos. And that atmosphere helped him too, he said that himself.
But the next day we would have the race, so the work wasn't finished, but Lewis Hamilton wanted more.
"We honestly didn't think he would win the race. A podium yes, but not the win. But I don't think anyone told him that, because he went in to win. We only really believed it when he was in P2 closing in on Verstappen. We thought Max was saving his tyres for when that happened, but the truth is he wasn't. The man was getting closer with every lap and then the near certainty of victory took over the pits. The mood changed inside, the grandstand roared every time he passed in front of us and we started clenching our fists, just as he certainly was inside the car."
"That manoeuvre on lap 48 from Max didn't scare us, the man knew that was going to happen, so much so that he sidestepped Max very easily. Then he knew he needed to lead Max into the error to get by before the braking at either turn 1 (Senna's S) or turn 4 (Lake turn). So he threatened at 1, Max went inside and then it was over, we knew he would pass on the opposite straight next."
"I didn't ask anyone, not even him, but for me it was the best performance I've seen a driver put in since I've been working in Formula 1 for almost 20 years."
"I don't know what will happen next, but that weekend was Lewis Hamilton's masterpiece. I don't know if or when we will see that again."
I don't think its obvious in general. In Brazil and a lot of other tracks you cant see it happening. Just found the behaviour in France corresponding with the related articles. Not stating it as facts. We'll have to wait and see if anything is coming out!RZS10 wrote: ↑18 Nov 2021, 17:44Ask yourself this ... If it was as obvious as you make it out to be then why
- do they themselves say it's hard to see (check related articles)
- did they only realize it now
- did they (supposedly) have two notebooks full of 'proof' when they went to the FIA
- did they have several other theories to explain the top speed advantage first
Based on what's happened previously though, even if the FIA decide there's something going on, they'll have to announce a change to the test and give a number of races notice etc etc.atanatizante wrote: ↑18 Nov 2021, 12:23There are rumours that the RB team will protest at Qatar against the Merc`s W12 main plain rear wing for bending downwards at the middle/centre of the wing, in the area where FIA don`t apply the load test. This bending it is occurring when the car`s speed is over 260kph ...
Here`s one footage ( just a poor one, unfortunately) and I just see only the endplates moving inwards at the car`s higher speed thus we can assume that the main plain rear wing is bending:
So on your basis, I can ignore any law as long as there is no impact on anyone else?carisi2k wrote: ↑16 Nov 2021, 04:52So many people are full of themselves here. Did the move cost Lewis a spot? Did he end up in the barrier and unconscious for a period of time? Did his car receive any damage? If the answer is no and Lewis was still able to go on and win the race then who now is trying to rig the result for their boy Lewis. Lewis now has an advantage with that nice new power unit and so the question will be if he doesn't now go on to win the world championship with this significant advantage then how good is he really.
Just goes to show how important the mental side of it is for a driver!Xero wrote: ↑19 Nov 2021, 17:06Taking a moment to praise the form of Bottas. Since it was announced he's going to Alfa Romeo he's been really quick! Just shows you the weight on his shoulders has been lifted, and was fighting the same mental battle Rosberg has frequently admitted to struggling with to compete with Lewis. If he had this pace all season I'm not convinced Russell would have replaced him for next season.
Absolutely!El Scorchio wrote: ↑19 Nov 2021, 17:08Just goes to show how important the mental side of it is for a driver!Xero wrote: ↑19 Nov 2021, 17:06Taking a moment to praise the form of Bottas. Since it was announced he's going to Alfa Romeo he's been really quick! Just shows you the weight on his shoulders has been lifted, and was fighting the same mental battle Rosberg has frequently admitted to struggling with to compete with Lewis. If he had this pace all season I'm not convinced Russell would have replaced him for next season.
It's exactly the same I think of Charles. He's exceeding what's capable in that Ferrari.zibby43 wrote: ↑19 Nov 2021, 06:27Some more comments from LEC, who continues to be one of my favorite drivers on the grid.
https://twitter.com/planet_f1/status/14 ... 37092?s=21
