Max Verstappen sought to find Oscar Piastri immediately after the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, to offer him an apology for their contact at the first corner.

The four-time World Champion was given a 10-second time penalty for being found wholly responsible for the collision which sent both drivers into a spin at Turn 1, with the Red Bull driver not fully alongside the McLaren as they tagged wheels on the exit.

Max Verstappen apologises to Oscar Piastri after Abu Dhabi GP collision

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher

Having started on the front row, Piastri fell to the back of the field and commented sarcastically that the Verstappen’s failed attempt at an overtake was the “move of a World Champion” on team radio.

He eventually recovered to take a single point in 10th place at the chequered flag, with McLaren sealing the Constructors’ Championship for the first time since 1998 after Lando Norris took the race victory at Yas Marina.

With a lengthy gap before next season starts, Verstappen wanted to make amends quickly to avoid any “weird feelings” with his fellow driver, having spoken of his view of the incident.

The complete F1 2024 head-to-head records after Abu Dhabi

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👉 F1 2024: Head-to-head race statistics between team-mates

“Launch was good, and then I tried to grab the inside and I quickly realised, once I committed to it, that the gap was closing and I wanted to try and get out of it, because I didn’t want to, naturally, of course, crash with Oscar,” Verstappen explained to media including PlanetF1.com.

“But unfortunately, we still clipped each other – but I already apologised to Oscar.

“It’s not what you want to happen, and especially not with him. He’s a great guy, but it happened. It’s just bit unfortunate.

“Honestly, I don’t want to talk about it. I’m just happy that the season is over.

“For me, the most important thing that I had to do was just apologise to Oscar, because I have nothing to gain, nothing to lose – I went for it, it didn’t work out.

“Especially also for him, you know that we both spun. It’s not nice. He’s a friend of mine, so I don’t want to have any, like, weird feelings or whatever going into the break.”

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