Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton were spotted in discussion after their near-miss in Monaco Grand Prix qualifying.

An FIA investigation was launched into Hamilton potentially impeding Red Bull’s Verstappen during Q1, an incident which Verstappen firmly pointed the finger at Ferrari over, not his former title rival Hamilton, after initially turning the air blue in reaction over team radio.

Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton clear the air at Monaco GP

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher

Verstappen, on a flying lap, came up behind the slow-moving Hamilton in the Ferrari, who was attempting to yield on the inside line through Massenet.

But Verstappen would back out of his lap and quickly took to Red Bull team radio to deliver a fiery message.

“**** Whoa! Mate! **** Lewis!” Verstappen vented.

“Massive impeding that!”

The FIA confirmed that they would investigate the incident following qualifying, with Hamilton going on to secure a provisional P4 on the grid and Verstappen P5.

And after both drivers exited the cockpit, they headed for a debrief of that near-miss, with Verstappen subsequently absolving Hamilton of blame.

Ferrari were not so lucky, with the situation having been exacerbated by miscommunication on the radio between Hamilton and race engineer Riccardo Adami, Hamilton mistakenly told that Verstappen was slowing down.

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Verstappen stressed that he was not angling for a Hamilton penalty, but pointed to last year’s Qatar Grand Prix, where Verstappen was given a rare one-place grid drop for an impeding incident involving George Russell, which led to the infamous stewards’ room scene and subsequent verbal warfare.

“At the time, of course, I was like, ‘What is going on here?’ It was quite clear that there was a car in my way,” Verstappen reflected on the Hamilton incident when speaking to the media including PlanetF1.com.

“But basically, the team [Ferrari] just told Lewis that I was suddenly driving slow. So then, of course, Lewis accelerates, which is I think normal, because he thinks that I’m on a slow lap, but I’m clearly not on a slow lap.

“Of course, I know that it’s not his fault, but I even got a one-place grid penalty [in Qatar 2024] like not even impeding on a fast lap. So yeah, if you get away with that, I’m really surprised.

“It’s not like I’m trying to get Lewis a penalty. It’s just the precedent of what they have been using in the stewards room.

“I know it’s the team’s fault, clearly, because Lewis is normally always quite correct with these things, you know, like moving out of the way, and no one really wants to impede anyone on purpose. So, yeah, this was just unfortunate. But, it happened.”

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