Former team mates Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton are at the center of this weekend’s Formula 1 controversy.*
Alonso is calling Hamilton’s overtaking the safety car “unfair,” although Hamilton is not seeing it that way. Here’s how the BBC has it:
“It was unfair – we respected the rules and didn’t overtake under the yellow flag,” said Alonso, who came eighth.
But Hamilton insisted he had not sought to gain any advantage from the move.
“I don’t really remember too much about it, to be honest,” said Hamilton in his post-race interview.
“As I was coming around Turn One, literally as I got to the safety car line I saw the safety car was pretty much alongside me. I thought that I’d passed it so I continued and that was it.”
And when told of Alonso’s anger was relayed to him, Hamilton said the Spaniard should stick to analysing his own performance.
“It’s good to know his weak point, I guess,” Hamilton, who spent a tumultuous season alongside Alonso as team-mates at McLaren, told BBC Sport.
“I just focus on my job, so maybe he should have done that.”
[snip]
But Alonso was adamant that the incident had been pivotal to his chances of success in front of his fellow Spaniards in Valencia.
“It completely destroyed the race,” said Alonso, who was subsequently promoted one place to eighth after an investigation into several drivers for driving too fast when the safety car was out.
“We finished ninth, he finished second so there is something to think about.
“We need to apologise to the 60,000 or 70,000 people who came here and saw this type of race.”
Alonso also is complaining that Hamilton’s penalty for the overtake came way too late.
Your View: Was the steward’s decision unfair? Did it come too late? And what might be the fall-out between Alonso and Hamilton?
* Note: I haven’t seen the race yet due in part to the delayed broadcast here in the U.S.
