Spanish Derby
The Spanish fans who flocked to the stands at the Madring to watch the Spanish GP on Sunday had little to celebrate. Both Fernando Alonso and Carlos Sainz, the two local heroes, are having a difficult season due to the poor performance of their respective cars and never really had the chance to compete for points in their home GP. However, the two compatriots found time to duel quite fiercely with each other, even coming into contact on track.
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A clash that raised the temperature between the two, both over the radio and in post-race statements. The stewards did not consider the clash between the Williams #55 and the Aston Martin #14 as a simple racing incident, but pointed to Sainz as responsible for the episode, penalizing him. A decision that had no impact on the race outcome – Sainz retired on lap 43 and Alonso finished in 17th place – but which fueled the tension between the two.
Sainz strikes back
Alonso described the penalty given to his compatriot as “fair” and provoked him, saying he wanted to finish “alive” at the end of a Grand Prix and did not want to have “incidents at 340km/h“. Words that, as expected, triggered a reaction from Sainz. Speaking to Spanish reporters after the race, the Williams driver did not hold back some sharp comments towards the veteran from Oviedo: “I think Fernando couldn’t get alongside me (with the car). We got to that corner and we touched. He opened the radio, complained and managed to get me penalized. I guess that was what he wanted and he succeeded. But we would have still finished sixteenth, so it didn’t change much“.
Sainz nevertheless ruled out that this episode could have repercussions on his relationship with Alonso: “There is no problem with Fernando. These are racing incidents that we will forget quickly. In my opinion, that penalty is useless, but it went like that. The layout of turn 5 favors contact because it forms a huge bottleneck. There have been incidents in F2 and F3 and there is no space for two cars to pass side by side“, Sainz concluded.
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