Lewis Hamilton warned how F1 title could be decided as Max Verstappen fear raised
express– Lewis Hamilton has been warned he could be ‘taken out’ by Max Verstappen in the F1 season finale as the battle for the Drivers’ Championship goes down to the wire. Hamilton claimed a dramatic win at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix on Sunday to draw level on points with Verstappen, despite being involved in another collision with his title rival.
The Brit started in pole position, keeping his lead until the tenth lap before Mick Schumacher crashed.
A safety car was deployed for a few laps until the red flag was issued – where Hamilton fell behind having decided to pit.
And Verstappen stayed ahead of him for much of the race, until being told to let Hamilton overtake him. However, Hamilton was unaware that Verstappen was letting him past and collided into the back of him when the Dutchman suddenly decided to brake.
Hamilton was furious with Verstappen, accusing his rival of ‘break testing’ him before later claiming that his driving sytle is ‘over the limit’.
Sky Sports pundit and former F1 driver Johnny Herbert agreed with Hamilton and fears Verstappen’s aggressive style could spoil the title decider Abu Dhabi next weekend.
“I don’t want to see the Championship decided by one of the drivers taking the other out,” Herbert said on Sky Sports News.
“And that would only be Max because of that comment he said about sort of having the advantage of the race wins.
“I hope it doesn’t come down to that because I just want to see the skill of these guys being tested, it’s been tested so far but let’s hope we have a clean one when we head to Abu Dhabi.”
Verstappen was given a 10-second time penalty and two penalty points for causing the collision with Hamilton at the Saudi GP on Sunday and Herbert insisted he was in the wrong despite the Dutchman’s angry response.
“It’s just a thing you don’t do as a Formula One racing driver,” he continued.
“It’s the way he does it, he brakes and slows so much.
“I remember texting Damon Hill at the time saying ‘he’s brake tested him!’
“Lewis really was in a bit of a confused state as I think you don’t normally see a driver slow down that much and do the brake.
“And that is where you go ‘Max, you don’t have to do that, you have the rawest skill as well as Lewis.”
The pair are both tied on 369.5 points ahead of the final race of the season in Abu Dhabi this Sunday.
