Hamilton shuts down Verstappen claim on qualifying incident

Lewis Hamilton bluntly disagreed with Max Verstappen's claim that Sebastian Vettel, Daniel Ricciardo and Nico Hulkenberg broke an "unwritten rule" by overtaking him during Chinese grand Prix qualifying, which ultimately prevented the Red Bull man from setting a final flying lap in Q3.

Verstappen was left furious after failing to cross the start-finish line before the chequered flag fell.

Verstappen said afterwards: "There is an unwritten rule that you just follow each other. But whatever. From now on in qualifying I'm going to f**k them up as well."

However, when Formula 1's official Instagram account posted a snippet of Verstappen's reaction, Hamilton simply replied: "Nope" – making clear whose side he was on.

👀👀👀#F1 #ChineseGP🇨🇳 #Race1000 pic.twitter.com/2eIusH90uY

— GPFans Global (@GPFansGlobal) April 13, 2019

Ricciardo explained why he had overtaken Verstappen, admitting that it had slightly gone against usual protocol.

“You had to go,” he said. “I think everyone just left it too tight.

"People got screwed because, I guess, we left it tight. You had to do what you had to do. Normally there is some etiquette but that went out the window with how tight it was.”

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