Sainz defends Piastri contact amid blue flag issues

Carlos Sainz downplayed his contact with Oscar Piastri in the Hungarian Grand Prix, suggesting the McLaren driver could have taken more care due to a blue flag system failure.

Early race control messages suggested drivers were being given erroneous information from the blue flag system, with warnings appearing despite the leader still being more than 30 seconds behind the last car. The FIA later confirmed it had to use the system manually, and Sainz received a blue flag panel at Turn 2 as Piastri approached, but says he was focused on fighting Fernando Alonso and did not get a warning in the cockpit, prior to the contact.

“We didn't have blue lights on the steering, which normally when we are in fights like that one where we are fighting for position, it helps us to understand whether we are getting lapped or not,” Sainz said.

“So at that stage I had no idea I was about to get lapped and on top of that I was in a big fight with Fernando trying to undercut him into the corner and I wouldn't have expected Oscar to be there. And even if he was there or I would have expected it, he was in my dead spot on the angle so it was impossible honestly from my side to avoid it.

“So probably a bit better communication would have helped but at the same time a racing thing that sometimes happens.”

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Sainz received a five-second time penalty for causing a collision, but suggests Piastri could have taken a different approach to lapping traffic given the issue with the blue flag system that was impacting the drivers.

“To be honest, I'm really sorry for Oscar but this time I think I have a pretty good excuse to what happened. I don't know if we could also have been a bit more careful given that he's the one fighting for podiums and he [could have] positioned himself a bit more cautiously because with all the issues we were all having with the blue flags. But yeah, it's a shame. I took the 5-second [penalty], I'm OK with it. I don't care when I'm fighting for P18.”

Piastri was in the net lead at the time and the incident cost him over two seconds as he didn’t clear Sainz for a number of corners that followed. With Lando Norris then pitting and emerging 0.8s ahead of Piastri, it was a costly moment, but Sainz said he didn’t need to speak with the Australian, who later retired from the race with a gearbox issue.

“I don't need this. It's a racing incident; he probably understands what happened just by knowing what happened. He didn't retire due to me or my fault, so it was just a contact and I'm glad he didn't disturb his race too much. But yeah, it's tough when we're all having these issues.”