Christian Horner believes that George Russell deliberately braked hard while behind the safety car at the Canadian Grand Prix in an attempt to catch out Max Verstappen. The Brit crossed the line first after a commanding performance, but Red Bull lodged an appeal after the chequered flag. Much was made of the Verstappen and Russell rivalry after the duo qualified on the front row on Saturday, but both drivers kept it clean at Turn One, and the reigning world champion was forced to settle for second place as the Brit clinched his fourth career Grand Prix victory under no shortage of pressure.
However, the race didn’t end without a talking point. After Lando Norris collided with team-mate Oscar Piastri and brought out the safety car, Verstappen briefly overtook Russell while at slow speed following a spot of braking from the Mercedes man. He complained about this on the radio, and it was later picked up by Red Bull.
“Two protests that we’ve put to the stewards, that we’ve asked them to have a look at,” Horner told the media after the race. “Firstly, relating to the erratic driving behind the safety car, where George very heavily braked, obviously looking in his mirror for Max.
“Then the second one is very clearly the distance that was left behind the safety car that was well in excess, I think at least three times in excess, of the permitted distance. It’s within our right to obviously protest that, so we’ve lodged the protest, it’s with the stewards now, and we’ll see what they say.”
Horner later admitted that there were pre-race conversations with the FIA based on comments made by Russell on Thursday. The Mercedes driver confessed that he planned to take maximum advantage of Verstappen’s penalty point predicament.
“I think you could hear from George’s press comments yesterday, his objective was reasonably clear,” he continued. “I don’t think there was any surprises with that. I think that it’s inevitable that there was going to be some potential gamesmanship.
“It’s something that we raised after the drivers’ briefing with the race director, just so that they were mindful of it as well, because it’s clear that kind of stuff goes on. But Max, I thought he’s been squeaky clean all weekend and drove a very good race today.
“We just said to him [the race director] could they please keep an eye on it because, there’s been, obviously, comments that have been raised in the media, just please keep an eye on it.”