F1 News
Villeneuve: Red Bull were dangerous, but Verstappen was perfect
Bobby Vincent
Former world champion Jacques Villeneuve believes the punishment of a five-second time penalty for Max Verstappen was fair, and the Canadian praises the focus and enthusiasm of the 21-year-old.
Verstappen was penalised for a pit collision with Valtteri Bottas, with the Red Bull Racing team sending an "unsafe release", forcing the Dutchman to be ahead of the Finn coming out of the pit-lane.
For the rest of the race in Monaco, it was Verstappen trying to get in front of Lewis Hamilton, who was a place above at the top of the grid, to try and open up a significant gap to the Brit, who was running very slow due to tyre problems.
However, the Dutchman couldn't break the stern defence from the five-time world champion, but Villeneuve has heaped the praise on Verstappen, who he believes "drove a perfect race" in Monaco.
"It was a dangerous action by the team," Villeneuve said on Red Bull's pit-release to Sky Sports Italia. "In Monaco, you can't actually do this, because there is so little space in the pit-lane.
"The action put employees of other teams at risk and therefore the penalty should have been higher. For Verstappen, a higher penalty had not changed the final classification, but in the future, teams have to think twice before taking the risk.
"If you see how he almost manages to pass Hamilton, I think you can say that Verstappen has driven a perfect race. He got the most out of his car."
