Nikita Mazepin has apportioned blame on Haas team-mate Mick Schumacher for what he labelled a “disaster” of a qualifying session for this weekend’s Dutch Grand Prix.
The pair were fighting to get out of Q1 as they prepared for a final attempt but ended up alongside one another approaching the penultimate corner, blocking Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel on his flying lap in the process.
It was later established that Schumacher had overtaken Mazepin on the out-lap, which the Russian felt went against the team’s agreement over who would have priority for track position.
The incident was notified by the FIA with all three drivers summoned to see the stewards.
“I was meant to be the first guy,” Mazepin said, as quoted by The Race. “To dictate the pace for the outlap and the drivers around, but your team-mate isn’t able to overtake you.
“Well, it happened. Second time that he overtook me, backed me up.
“I’ll have a word with the team to see why that happened.”
Mazepin went on to claim it wasn’t the first time this year Schumacher had disobeyed the arrangement and overtook him to gain track position, accusing him of deliberately compromising his lap.
Schumacher managed to just cross the line to start a second lap before the chequered flag was waved, while Mazepin returned to the pits, ending up behind his team-mate on the grid.
“I am not happy because if you do it once and you didn’t know about it that’s fine, but if you keep doing it twice, that’s deliberate,” Mazepin said.
“There shouldn’t be any tension like that in the team. There’s no point, so I’m f****d off.
“I already told the team what I think and they agree, so I don’t know what the other party says.”
Schumacher revealed he had requested to the team if he could pass Mazepin amid concerns his tyres were too cold prior to his last lap in Q1.
“We spoke with the team about it, I went through the pitlane, my tyres were cooling down, so usually what I do is do faster outlap,” Schumacher said.
“In that case, Nikita was doing a slow outlap so I requested to overtake which I got the OK to do so, which I did. Early enough.
“I had Lando as well between us so I don’t really understand the confusion which happened in the last corner. Obviously, that messed up a few things for everybody.”
Schumacher admitted the incident was a frustrating one for the American-owned team, but felt he did nothing wrong.
“Obviously I have to see how it is from the outside,” he said.
“I think that the team were for sure frustrated about it. For me, from what I know, I did everything right.”
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