Daniel Ricciardo thinks Silverstone incident played a role in Italian GP crash between Lewis and Max

2021 Italain Grand Prix winner Daniel Ricciardo enjoyed his most successful weekend since joining McLaren this season.

After qualifying fifth for Saturday’s sprint race, the Australian secured a front row start for Sunday’s race. He didn’t stop there, overtaking Verstappen in the very first lap and staying there to record McLaren’s first win in nine years and his 8th career win.

The Honey Badger appeared on the Pardon My Take podcast. When asked about the lap 26 crash involving Verstappen and Hamilton, he suggested the Dutchman carried frustration from Silverstone, which may have led to the crash.

The Aussie said, “I know Max, like I was teammates with him for a few years. He’s a competitor, and he’ll leave it on the track and that’s it. Obviously, I guess he still probably carried a little bit of, maybe like frustration, or anger, or emotion from Silverstone.

So, maybe that was the reason he was like, ‘Stuff this, I’m just going to walk away.’”

Ricciardo believes Max checked on Lewis before walking away

Following the crash, cameras caught Verstappen walking straight off the track, which made it seem like he ignored Hamilton. However, Ricciardo believed the Dutchman seeing his rival attempt to reverse made him walk past almost immediately.

He said, “I think there was things like Lewis trying to reverse and get out. So, look, I’ve already probably got too involved, but maybe Max saw that and was like, ‘Okay, Lewis is fine.’”

Furthermore, Ricciardo also admitted any F1 driver would look out for the other despite any rivalry they may have. 

“For sure we’ve got rivalries, and for sure we don’t all get on the best. But if we had a crash and we knew that guy was injured, 100% hand on heart I believe all of us would go and try and help. If we knew it was something serious, we wouldn’t just turn our backs”.

Help us to grow big  by Following us on twitter, facebook and Google News