Carlos Sainz fumes at "scarily dangerous" Romain Grosjean for "unacceptable" manoeuvre

Carlos Sainz

Sainz fumes at "scarily dangerous" Grosjean for "unacceptable" manoeuvre

Haas driver was shown a black-and-white flag for unsportsmanlike driving

Ian Parkes

Monday 3 August 2020 09:02

McLaren driver Carlos Sainz has slated Romain Grosjean as "scarily dangerous" for an "unacceptable" defensive move that almost caused a high-speed crash during the British Grand Prix.

Haas driver Grosjean was shown a black-and-white flag for unsportsmanlike driving after he jinxed in the braking zone heading into Stowe as he attempted to hold off McLaren's Sainz.

Following the race, Grosjean was later ordered to see the stewards following a further dubious manoeuvre in defending against Renault's Romain Grosjean but escaped with a warning.

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Sainz, though, was far from happy, in particular given the two violent crashes already witnessed in the race involving the second Haas of Kevin Magnussen in the wake of his collision with Red Bull's Alex Albon on lap one, and AlphaTauri's Daniil Kvyat who suffered a suspected rear puncture that sent him hurtling into a barrier at Maggotts.

"It's unacceptable," said Sainz of Grosjean's move. "You could clearly see he was waiting for me to get close and to go side by side, to give me a shock.

"We're doing 300kph and we need to respect each other a bit more because you've seen a couple of accidents that were huge.

"As drivers, we don't realise the speed we're going. I nearly crashed into Romain because he moved so late. I think he will have a look at it and he will regret it because it's scarily dangerous and unacceptable."

For his part, Grosjean felt he had left both Sainz and Ricciardo enough room.

Sainz was on course for a fifth-place finish until becoming the second of three delamination victims in the final laps as Mercedes duo Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton also suffered.

Although the Spaniard managed to limp back to the pits for fresh tyres, he finished outside of the points in 13th.

"It's the story of this first half of the season for me," said a despondent Sainz. "It doesn't look like we have mother luck with us yet.

"On the hard tyre it was difficult to make it to the end, but everything felt under control until the exact moment that everything went off."

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