Wheatley says McLaren boss Brown apologized to Hulkenberg after F1 US GP collision

Jack Brown personally apologized Nico Hulkenberg After blaming him for the retirement of oscar piastri And lando norris From the Formula 1 United States Grand Prix Sprint, according to Sauber Boss Jonathan Wheatley.

The McLaren driver crashed out on the first lap of Saturday’s race. Championship leader Piastri attempted to cut down on teammate and title rival Norris at Turn 1 in the battle for second place.

But as he attempted the move, he was tagged by Hulkenberg’s Sauber and dropped into Norris, who was sandwiched between Piastri and. fernando alonsoAt the top is Aston Martin.

It was deemed a racing incident, but only after Brown criticized it on Sky Sports F1. Driving “amateur”, Hulkenberg claims he “had no business being where he was”.,

However, the McLaren CEO later retracted his statement to Sky after watching another replay in which he spoke to members of the Sauber team to clarify the situation.

Wheatley said, “Zak sent me an apology immediately after. He personally apologized to Nico.”

“Look, it’s a passionate sport, I love passion. You have two cars, you’re fighting for the world championship, and the two cars take out the first corner.

“Sometimes it’s easy to think it’s someone else’s fault and you react with passion. I think he probably did that with Sky TV – the heat and emotion of the moment. But I’ve known Zac for a very long time. He’s a racer. We’re all racers and we sorted it out later.”

Although the incident did not end Hülkenberg’s race, it cost him the chance to score points as the German ultimately finished 13th, but he had more success the following day.

Hulkenberg came in eighth in Sunday’s race, the first time he has scored in the points since scoring a podium at July’s British Grand Prix. The result means he moves up in the Championship to now sit ninth isaac hadjar,

“We got a bit of the Nico Hulkenberg effect this weekend,” said Wheatley, whose experienced driver only joined Sauber this year. “To Nico, what an incredible race weekend.

“I think all the people who have been critical about him over the last few months, his qualifying performance, various other criticisms, I think we’ve probably got reason to take another look at him because he was flawless from the first lap in FP1.

“You can’t help but wonder what the sprint would have brought if that incident in Turn 1 hadn’t happened. I’m pretty sure we would have got some serious points out of that too and then today, look at him, he drove a flawless race again.”

But Austin was the star of the weekend max verstappenBecause the Red Bull driver dominated both races from pole and put himself in contention for his fifth consecutive world championship. He is third in the standings and 40 points behind Piastri with five rounds remaining, but just five races ago the points difference was 104.

Verstappen is F1’s most in-form driver after Red Bull brought an upgrade to Monza at the start of this race, making him the bookmakers’ joint favorite for the title with Piastri.

“You can never rule out Max Verstappen,” said Wheatley, who joined Sauber this year after previously working as Red Bull’s sporting director.

“Red Bull is a class racing team. Max Verstappen is probably the best driver in the world. The fact that they’ve got some performance in the car, I think they’re probably kicking themselves that they didn’t get it sooner.

“But I’m not surprised they’ve been able to do it. Over the years I worked there, there was often a huge change between Friday night and Saturday in terms of performance. If I were McLaren, I’d be looking in my rear-view mirror.”

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– Autosport.com Team