Sergio Perez not sure why F1 Monaco GP incident was not investigated, as he and Kevin Magnussen reflect plus Nico Hulkenberg calls it unnecessary.
After being knocked out in Q1, Red Bull’s Perez had the worst result in F1 Monaco GP where he couldn’t even see-through the Lap 1. It was a heavy shunt going through Turn 2 and Turn 3, when he collided with Haas’ Magnussen and Hulkenberg.
The Dane tried a move on the outside of the straight. He touched the wall and then also Perez who was trying to get onto the racing line with Hulkenberg on his left. This led to a contact between the Mexican driver and Magnussen, which also caught the German.
There was heavy damage to the car of Perez followed by Magnussen, with little less on Hulkenberg’s side. Speaking about the incident, both thought that they didn’t give each other room or could have handled things in a better way.
The biggest drawback from the side of Perez was the lack of investigation for a larger incident when another clash between the Alpine drivers Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon was investigated where the latter was handed a time penalty converted to grid drop.
Hulkenberg termed it unnecessary incident where Magnussen was perhaps a bit too optimistic. He reckoned racing incident was fine call but could have gone any way. The crash resulted in barrier damage and also a photographer being hit with debris.
The FIA noted that he was taken to the medical center and was released soon after, with a note that ‘..but has no open wounds’. Perez, on his social media, added: “The most important thing today is that we can all go home.
“It was a very serious and completely unnecessary accident from my point of view. I also hope that every photographer that was in the area is ok. It’s a weekend to learn from and turn around as a team. Preparation for Canada begins now.”
The no investigation from the FIA stewards came as a relief for Magnussen, who is still with 10 penalty points against his name and could have been banned from Canadian GP if the blame was to come on his shoulders for the Monaco GP incident.
Crash –
Perez: “It’s Lap 1. I lost a position to one of the RBs and obviously it’s lap one, it’s just important if you’re not in the right position, automatically you’re going to end up losing. I was getting out of the corner. If you see my onboard, at no point you see Kevin’s car – not even close to me, alongside me, and you could see that the wall is just getting closer and closer. To keep it flat out, there was only one way out of it, and it was either contact with my car or with the barrier. There was just simply no room for both cars and at some point, he had to realise that – I mean, I’ve been in that occasion – and many times when you are the car behind you just have to realise that it’s time to back off, before things get closer to you. I’m very surprised the incident was not investigated because of the amount of damage and how dangerous the damage was. I’m really surprised.”
Stewards approach –
Perez: “I think he clearly shouldn’t be there in the first place because there is just one way to get out of that. It will be just to hit the wall, he either hit the wall or hit my car. The right side of my car. So how does he want me to leave him room if he’s not even alongside? There’s a point where you see the wall is coming to you and you just have to back off. It has happened to me many times and there’s a point where you just have to back off. I’m really surprised. I get the lap one ‘let them race’, but I think this was more dangerous driving just to keep it flat out knowing that they were going to come contact me. At some point I think that was some dangerous driving. I don’t think he really thinks about the outcome. You sometimes find yourself in a position and you have to take a very quick decision to say, ‘okay, there’s only one way of it and it’s going to be contact so I’d better back out’ – but he will go for the contact.”
Perez squeeze –
Magnussen: “In my point of view I was there and I got squeezed to the wall. From my point of view I had a good part of my front along Perez’s rear. When he went to the wall, I just got pushed into the wall and made contact with him. I trusted that he was going to leave a space for me since I was there. It’s not a corner that you’re braking into. It’s just like a little bend on the straight so you have to have a car width otherwise you leave the guy no option. He clearly wasn’t leaving space that I thought he would. I had a good part of my front end, my whole front wheel was ahead of his rear wheel. So, I did expect him to be leaving room for one car on his right, especially since he didn’t have anyone on his inside. On his left, there was a completely clear track. So he just squeezed me into the wall. It’s not good to see both cars in one crash. It sucks. It’s a shitty, shitty situation. It’s unfortunate, it’s a lot of cost to the team, a lot of work for the guys and a missed opportunity today of course.”
Unnecessary situation –
Hulkenberg: “It’s obviously far from ideal and also both cars out. Obviously I got taken off by an incident that I wasn’t directly involved in. It’s quite narrow here going up to turn three. A big shame. Things were getting too tight there. I think it’s somewhat a racing incident. It looked maybe a bit optimistic from Kevin, but I don’t know, Checo could have also maybe seen him and left room. It was obviously stupid between Kevin and Checo. I don’t know if Checo saw Kevin. Checo could have left space. At the same time, I think Kevin was also very optimistic about staying on there, where the track gets narrower and there are little kinks up to Turn 3. So unfortunate, obviously, the outcome. My car didn’t have too much damage. I didn’t see Kevin’s. But the Red Bull had significant damage. I think that’s a write off. On our side, I don’t know. We’ll see the damage once the cars are back.”
Here’s the crash: https://www.formula1.com/en/video/2024-monaco-grand-prix-onboard-for-the-lap-1-crash-between-perez-magnussen-and-hulkenberg.1800123784353491216
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