Sebastian Vettel lost third place in the Mexican Grand Prix in the wake of turning into the principal driver to be rebuffed under another unsafe driving standard.
The Ferrari driver was punished 10 seconds for moving while in the braking zone while guarding from Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo late in the race.
“Don’t get me wrong, I love racing,” he continued, “I love racing hard, I love seeing locking brakes and even a bit of contact is fine, but this whole moving under braking, if you’re going to defend, you commit early and that’s it. You don’t do it once you’ve already been outfoxed. I feel like that’s what I did today, Seb was there, he moved, I went, I won the chess match if you like.
“And then he’s like ‘oh, I screwed up, and now I’m going to try and repair my mistake’. For me that’s not right.”
The 29-year-old additionally had two punishment directs included toward his racing permit.
Vettel had been elevated to third after Ricciardo’s team-mate Max Verstappen was punished for compromising. “I want to look at it again; he [Ricciardo] told me to. I am fighting hard and am supposed to give him just enough room,” Vettel said.
“I know Daniel is sometimes optimistic going for a gap. I knew he would go for it whatever the cost. I tried to defend; we made contact. That is not ideal. That’s why I want to look at it again.
“If there was something, I will talk to him. Before that, Max was brake-testing me into the first two corners. I was very upset with the fact Max held me up and didn’t move and made me run into Daniel.”
Before learning and knowing : “He doesn’t deserve to be up there. I thought I had every right to be there but he kept closing the door under braking. I was frustrated with that.”
It was an administer illumination issued by race executive Charlie Whiting on a particular issue that has brought about debate this year on the grounds that numerous drivers felt Verstappen had transgressed their refined man’s assention not to move under braking.
Incidentally, Vettel was one of the prime pundits of Verstappen’s driving. The new clarification states: “Any change of direction under braking which results in another driver having to take evasive action will be considered abnormal and hence potentially dangerous to other drivers. Any such move will be reported to the stewards.”
