Racing
© Jonathan Borba
Damon Hill said Max Verstappen “can’t really complain” about Alex Albon squeezing him in the Miami Grand Prix, accusing the Red Bull driver of objecting to the same kind of hard racing he often uses himself.
Speaking to BBC Radio 5 Live, the 1996 Formula 1 world champion reacted to Verstappen’s radio outburst after a midfield battle with Albon. Verstappen had dropped into traffic after spinning at Turn 2 on the opening lap while fighting Charles Leclerc, then worked his way back through the field before running into the Williams driver.
When Albon defended and forced Verstappen toward the pit-entry bollard, Verstappen complained to race engineer GianPiero Lambiase: “Mate, he just squeezed me onto the bollard! What the f***! That’s not allowed.”
Hill did not agree with that reaction. “Hearing him complaining about Alex Albon regaining the place and squeezing Max Verstappen,” Hill said on BBC Radio 5 Live, “I have to say, Max can’t really complain about other people doing things like that to him. He does it enough to everyone else.”
That criticism was aimed less at the move itself than at Verstappen’s response to it. Hill’s view was that Albon had simply reclaimed the position and defended robustly, leaving little sympathy for a complaint from a driver whose own racecraft has long pushed the same limits.
Hill underlined that point by referring to Verstappen’s fight with Lewis Hamilton in Saturday’s sprint. In that duel, Verstappen attacked into Turn 11, both cars ran wide, and Verstappen had to give the place back.
Even there, Hill was clear he rated the move as an attacking effort. “You’d have to say it was a good pass attempt by Max,” he said. “He actually got down inside, and it was almost as if everyone else was going too slowly. They were sort of concertinaing up and almost as if Lewis had kind of backed out of it. And Max just went for the gap.”
Hill then summed up the style that made Verstappen’s complaint to Albon ring hollow to him. Verstappen, he said, goes “very deep and uses all the road,” which is precisely why the former world champion saw little basis for outrage when Albon raced him the same way in Miami.