He lost the engine as a result of the collision and that was his race over. It ended up being a miserable home race for Red Bull with Verstappen out so early, while Yuki Tsunoda finished a long way off the points.
Verstappen swore over the radio after the collision, raging at “f***ing idiots” at a time when he was still unaware who had taken him out. But he had already calmed down by the time he climbed out of his car as Antonelli immediately came over to apologise.
And Verstappen continued to show grace in his post-session media interviews as he made it clear he won’t hold it against the teenager. “Every driver has made a mistake like that. No-one does that on purpose,” he said of Antonelli’s error.
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For the Mercedes rookie, it was a galling error off the back of his best result in his brief Formula 1 career last time out. But, after that maiden podium in Montreal, he was brought crashing back down to earth and was highly apologetic to both his Mercedes colleagues and to Verstappen.
He said: “I didn’t brake too late, but when I braked I braked hard and I locked the rears and just couldn’t stop the car. I had to avoid [Liam] Lawson but it was too late because I locked the front and instead of decelerating, the car was just taking speed and the crash was inevitable.
“I’m just super sorry to the team and of course to Max, because obviously he was just a passenger. It’s a big mistake and we now move forward and focus on Silverstone. We’ll see if we get a penalty or not, but it’s important to get back and to start doing like I did in Canada.”
Mercedes struggled for pace in the hot Spielberg sunshine, though George Russell was able to steer the other Silver Arrow to fifth place. But Red Bull would have nothing at all to show for their efforts in Austria and Verstappen is 61 points adrift of championship leader Oscar Piastri, who finished second behind winner Lando Norris.
But Verstappen was not confident that he was going to score big anyway, having been restricted to seventh place in qualifying. He said: “It was just unlucky, like yesterday in qualifying. Overall, we didn’t really have great pace this weekend anyway so a lot of learning for us and we can hopefully do better next weekend.
“Of course, not an ideal result today. We try to do out best, always. I have won a lot in the past, sometimes you have to accept that you are not winning and do the best you can.”
