Sergio Perez and Felipe Massa both ended the Canadian Grand Prix in hospital on Sunday.
The Force India and Williams drivers had been battling for a podium position on the last lap of the race with Perez in fourth and Massa, the fastest man on the track in fifth.
Perez had been battling for the race victory only a few laps before, but had been struggling with brake issues, whilst Massa had relatively brand new tyres and had previously been catching the race leaders by around two-seconds per lap.
The two collided going into the first corner, with Massa clipping Perez’s rear left wheel. The two cars smashing into the wall at 27G narrowly missing the Red Bull of Sebastian Vettel.
Both drivers were later released from hospital after precautionary checks.
Video footage of the incident appears to show conflicting arguments. Aerial shots of Perez clearly show that he hasn’t followed the racing line of Sebastian Vettel only a few yards in front of him, but if he has braking issues he may well be attempting to take a cleaner line from the dirty air of Vettel which would be cooler for temperatures.
That said he also appears to be turning early into the corner, possibly defending his position despite the obviously increased speed of Massa.
But one on-board screen shot of Massa appears to show him fractionally turning right towards Perez just before the impact.
Obviously the Canadian race stewards have access to a lot more information, data and images than us spectators at home and they have adjudged Perez to be at fault, hitting him with a five-place grid penalty for the Austrian Grand Prix.
‘It was dangerous and we could have had a very serious accident, so for me the penalty is not enough,’ said Massa to the BBC following his release from hospital.
‘It’s not the first time he turned into somebody under braking. He has done this many times, but he didn’t say anything [when Massa spoke to Perez in hospital]. He just turned and left.’
The Mexican may have not said anything to the Brazilian, but to the media Perez was happy to argue that it was Massa’s fault: ‘I watched several replays of the incident and I can’t help but notice how Felipe turns right just before he hits me.
‘I can only think he must have changed his mind and wanted to rejoin the racing line. His misjudgement cost us a big amount of points.’
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