Verstappen calms things down after his skirmish with Hamilton in EL2

It felt like we were in the middle of a Grand Prix with two drivers fighting for a crucial victory. However, it was only a free practice session on Friday.

But perhaps the passing of arms between Max Verstappen and his rival Lewis Hamilton this Friday afternoon in Austin (Texas) reflects the growing tension in the fight for the title.

Reminder of the facts: while he was about to start a flying lap in EL2, the leader of the world championship was grilled inside by the man he is ahead of by 6 points in the Drivers' standings.

The two grid leaders then found themselves jostling for position on the start/finish straight. The duel continued until the first braking, before Verstappen let Hamilton slip away. Not without insulting him as an idiot on the radio and giving him the middle finger.

Let it flow, his engineer told him. Message visibly received by Verstappen. After the session, the person concerned did not want to add fuel to the fire when he was questioned about the incident.

« We were all getting ready for a wild ride, I didn't really understand what happened “, he simply replied.

The Dutchman seemed more concerned about his relatively modest times this Friday, even if here too he wanted to play down his 3rd and 8th times of the day.

« It was a complicated day, whispered Verstappen on Friday evening. The track is quite bumpy and it's not easy to find the best compromise on the car. But we were still able to learn some positive lessons.

In EL2, we didn't manage to set a representative lap with the soft compound and it was a bit of a mess with the traffic. ».

This is generally the case when no one wants to give up even the slightest inch of ground to the competition!