Maldonado ‘tried to drive me off the track’ – Button

2015 Singapore Grand Prix

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Jenson Button laid the blame for his collision with Pastor Maldonado in the Singapore Grand Prix at the Lotus driver’s feet.

The pair came to grief at turn 17 while Button was trying to pass his rival.

“I was in tenth behind the two Lotuses and they were unbelievably slow,” Button told reporters after the race.

“I hit the back of Maldonado – I can’t say any different – but I sort of expected him to touch the throttle out of the corner and he didn’t. So I don’t know what was going on there, but I found myself in the back of him.”

“But two corners before that I was on the inside of him and he just tried to drive me straight off the circuit and it’s like, you can’t do that in F1, especially around a circuit like this. But it’s not the last time he’ll do it.”

Button later retired with a gearbox problem, but prior to the collision he said he had been pleased with the car’s pace and his strategy.

“The Safety Cars – we were very lucky with both of them. We went very long on our strategy so obviously it opens up Safety Cars in a good way.”

“The first one we sat in the pits for 30 seconds trying to get the wheel on the front-right, so it didn’t help us, but the second one really helped us. And the actual pace was good considering the lengths we were doing.”

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    Keith Collantine
    Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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    28 comments on “Maldonado ‘tried to drive me off the track’ – Button”

    1. So button is saying he got the red mist and rammed Maldonado. OK then.

    2. Crybaby Button now? Alonso´s influence?

      1. Next time please look at the race and then talk about it… Maldonado was slow, Jenson atacked him one corner before, got right next to him and Maldonado going in his “normal” behaviour off the track full power like a baboon and got the position back to the next corner (with off-track driving, which is BTW illegal) where he then braked in the exit of the next corner. Have u evere driven a car before? Do u know what is the reaction time of a person if someone brakes infront of u for no rational reason?? There was no vay Jenson was able to prevent the stupidity of Maldonado. If u dont like Jenson than say it, no need for this kind of comments…

    3. So we have a mind changer here

    4. Hopefully Maldonado’s days are numbered. If Renault buys Lotus, and more cash is injected in the team, surely they’d prefer a driver that doesn’t crash 90% of the time and is competent enough. Grosjean outqualifying him most of the times even after missing FP1, reaching Q3 after Pastor is knocked out in Q1, carbon fibre bits from his car laying around all over the world… Money surely can buy that back, can it?!

      1. It depends on whether you have a corrupt comunist goverment oil company funding you or not….

        1. Can we leave politics out of it for once, just once.

    5. This reminds me of a parody made by a youtuber, its funny, When Button makes excuses.

    6. As frustrating as Maldonado must be to work with for the team, if it wasn’t for his money they would have gone to the wall ages ago. Its down to his money (apart from last month) that the staff got paid. I’m sure none of them would mind taking his money for another season as I doubt Renault will be competitive next season in any event. Hes got a contract already why not take the money??

    7. Sometimes it’s easy for people to pick on the person with the track record, in this scenario Maldonado is that guy. It was a racing incident but if I had to apportion blame it would be Jenson’s head, and he should be man enough to accept at least some responsibility and move on. If the incident was with a different driver I don’t think he would’ve used such flagrant language (calling Maldonado “mental”).

      1. *It would be on Jenson’s head.

    8. 100% Jenson fault. Maldonado did nothing wrong.

    9. From a road traffic point of view Jenson went into the back so can be accused of being at fault. But Maldonados driving up until that was poor and the fact Jenson was able to accelerate with a Honda engine into the back of a Mercedes engined car makes me question fault.

      I remember the attitude from him at the end of 2013 when he started accusing Williams of sabotaging him, he probably knows given his total lack of results and the inevitable Renault takeover that he’s for the chop.

    10. No he didnt. Button should apologise to Maldonado for his childish language.

    11. How many crashes and collisions has Maldonado been in altogether?

    12. Jenson pleeeease, just race

    13. Looked to me like Maldo was trying to hold a tight line out of the corner, but he was going seriously slow when Button hit him, can’t really blame either. I didn’t get a good view of the first move, but it looked more like Button pushing Maldonado out than the other way around to me?

    14. Really didn’t need to see another large piece of bodywork flying up and coming down into the path of following cars. JB’s been doing this for more than 15 years and has a good, clean reputation. But is it really necessary to aim at the back of another car and expect it to disappear?

      1. Er… yes!

      2. If you’re in a McLaren and chasing a Mercedes-powered car… I’d say that’s what you’d spend all season doing.

    15. If Maldonado brake tested him, then it should be with the stewards. The fact it isn’t is an odd one. Why wasn’t it investigated? Any dab of the brake pedal would be right there in the telemetry.

      1. Well the stewards did look into it and their decision was no further action, so I’m going to go with the wild theory that Maldonado didn’t brake test him and therefore there is nothing weird or mysterious about it.

    16. Look, Jenson might not be entirely right this time. Maldonado went on the power slow enough to put him in a rather unpleasant position, true, but ultimately it was Jenson who didn’t do enough to take evasive action. That puts the blame at 50/50 for me, and I think the stewards’ decision to take no further action here was the right one.

      However, one has to wonder what is it that puts Maldonado in this kind of situations virtually all the time? He’s been involved in incidents he didn’t cause before and in some cases, like this one, he doesn’t carry all the blame, but it HAS to have something to do with his driving, really…
      How I see it is that his driving is simply sloppy. I think he never carries the right amount of confidence behind the wheel (being overconfident in questionable situations or vice-versa) and that a high level of inconsistency or unpredictability in his driving just triggers other drivers’ erratic reactions (or lack thereof altogether).

      For me it has to be something in his on-track behaviour that makes other drivers stumble upon him so frequently. He’s been at the wrong place, at the wrong time way too many times to call it a coincidence anymore.

    17. I know Maldonado has done a lot of things in the past, but in this situation, Button has to take some blame. Maldonado isn’t obliged to take any particular line while being ahead. Button wasn’t expecting Maldonado to be there and made a lunge.
      Maldonado had won tyres, and he couldn’t accelerate out of the corner fast enough.
      I can bet you if the situation was reversed, and Button was the one ahead Maldonado, Maldonado would have got a penalty

    18. If you lay off of the throttle in those f1 cars they slow down faster than your street car under hard braking because of the downforce. If Maldy didnt get on the throttle (like jenson claims), then anyone behind him wouldnt have any time to react. I dont know whether he did or not, but i did see maldinado whipping his car around crazily on the corner before.

    19. But yea, i think his history has more to do with it than anything. I cant believe nobody has been raising hell about Hulkenburg’s 3 place penalty for next week.

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