Max Verstappen fumes at Red Bull over pit-lane crash in Miami sprint

Max Verstappen was left annoyed with Red Bull after they caused his pit-lane crash with Kimi Antonelli during the Miami sprint race.

18-year-old Mercedes star Antonelli started on pole for Saturday’s sprint which descended into chaos before the race had even begun.

Unusual heavy rain in the build-up caused Charles Leclerc to crash on his way to the grid, before the sprint was red-flagged as drivers complained of visibility issues.

On the restart, Antonelli lost the lead to Oscar Piastri who seemed certain to win until the final few laps when Lando Norris jumped his McLaren teammate thanks to a well-timed pit-stop and safety car.

Midway through the sprint, with the track rapidly drying, Verstappen stopped for dry tyres only for his Red Bull pit crew to release him into the path of Antonelli.

The Dutchman hit the back of the Mercedes, heavily damaging his front wing and forcing the Italian to abort his stop.

Antonelli eventually finished out of the points in 10th while Verstappen crossed the line fourth, but was unsurprisingly slapped with a 10-second penalty for the unsafe release.

As the sprint finished under the safety car with the grid close together, the penalty dropped the reigning champion down to 17th, losing valuable ground in the championship battle with Piastri and Norris.

‘Come on guys!’ Verstappen fumed over the team radio, with this the latest pit error involving Red Bull this season.

‘They have all been different incidents [this year]. You can’t compare these things,’ the 27-year-old told Sky Sports afterward.

‘We all don’t want that to happen but it happened. It’s something we need to investigate but I’m just happy no one got injured.

‘With these cars if you hit someone, it’s not great. It’s super clear what happened, so there’s not much more for me to add.’

‘It was a human error. We’ll learn from it,’ Red Bull boss Christian Horner simply added, but his Mercedes counterpart was not impressed.

But a visibly furious Toto Wolff wasn’t satisfied however, with the Mercedes boss saying: ‘If it was the main race that would be seriously annoying.

‘But I am surprised about the total lack of judgement there because he wasn’t even close to releasing without any security concerns so somebody panicked.’

All drivers and teams will be hoping for a calmer qualifying on Saturday night before the main grand prix on Sunday.

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