Lewis Hamilton accused Mercedes team-mate and Formula One championship leader Nico Rosberg of deliberately colliding with him to wreck his Belgian Grand Prix hopes "to prove a point".
The incident on lap two yesterday left Hamilton with a puncture and ultimately led to the Briton's retirement from the race, while Rosberg went on to finish second and extend his lead to 29 points.
Hamilton told reporters that the German, whose car's front wing clipped Hamilton's rear tyre in a failed attempt to overtake, had done it on purpose. "We just had a meeting about it and he basically said he did it on purpose. He said he did it on purpose," repeated the Briton. "He said he could have avoided it. He said 'I did it to prove a point'."
"You don't have to just rely on me, go and ask [Mercedes team managers] Toto [Wolff] and Paddy [Lowe]who are not happy with him as well," Hamilton added. "I was gobsmacked when I was listening to the meeting. You need to ask him what point he was trying to make."
Rosberg, whose relationship with Hamilton has deteriorated this season as their boyhood friendship fragments, told reporters that the collision was a racing incident.
"We had a discussion, as is important after such circumstances, because obviously what happened cost the team a lot of points. That is the main focus and the biggest issue with such a happening as today," said the Mercedes driver, who stepped on to the podium to boos and whistles from the crowd. "I'm not going to go into any details, that wouldn't be the right thing to do. We need to review and discuss how we move forward."
Wolff later attempted to clarify what had happened in the meeting.
He said: "Nico felt he needed to hold his line. He needed to make a point. He [Rosberg] didn't give in. He thought it was for Lewis to leave him space, and that Lewis didn't leave him space. So they agreed to disagree in a very heated discussion among ourselves, but it wasn't deliberately crashing. That is nonsense."
Wolff had, however, in the immediate aftermath of the race - which was won by Red Bull's Daniel Ricciardo - said: "You don't try to overtake with the knife between your teeth in lap No.2 and damage both cars," adding that the incident was "absolutely unacceptable".
Retired triple champion and Mercedes non-executive chairman Niki Lauda, speaking before the meeting with drivers, said Rosberg was at fault since Hamilton was in front. "We lost the whole race, we could have been first and second … he provoked it, no question," he said.
"Accidents can happen, and I have foreseen them anyway if two guys are fighting freely all the way to the end, and it is accepted - but not on the second lap."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article