Sainz praises Antonelli for apologising after Spa radio outburst

Antonelli confronts Sainz after FP1 incident

Carlos Sainz has praised Kimi Antonelli for apologising in person after the Mercedes driver called him an “idiot” over team radio during opening practice for the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa-Francorchamps.

Sainz immediately gave his own account to his race engineer, saying: “I don’t know what Antonelli was doing with me. He throw the car into me, I don’t know why.”

The incident, however, was put into perspective when the two drivers met by chance on Saturday morning. Sainz said they entered the lift at the same time, giving Antonelli the opportunity to address the confrontation directly.

“The guy is a great guy,” Sainz said after qualifying. “He just apologised, said that it was the heat of the moment, that he had seen the replay and I actually didn’t impede him that much.”

Sainz values direct apology

Antonelli also acknowledged that the incident had occurred during FP1 rather than an important qualifying or race lap, and admitted he had become overly emotional despite not being impeded significantly.

For Sainz, the manner of the apology mattered as much as its content. “When someone comes out like that and tells that to your face straight away as soon as he sees you, for me it’s a show of being a great guy,” he said. “So I have no other thing than to thank him for it and wish him the best.”

The exchange came after a qualifying session that produced sharply contrasting outcomes for the pair. Antonelli secured pole position, a result covered in our report on his sixth pole of the year at Spa, while Sainz qualified 15th. He will start one place higher because of Isack Hadjar’s grid penalty.

Sainz faces difficult Belgian GP weekend

Even so, Sainz continued to deliver a notable qualifying benchmark within Williams. He outqualified team-mate Alex Albon for the 10th time this season and the fifth consecutive occasion.

His own assessment of the weekend remained muted. Sainz described the Belgian Grand Prix as “such a tough weekend” after a technical problem cost him an estimated three to five tenths per lap throughout practice. The issue was resolved before qualifying, but its precise cause remained unclear.

“Happy that we found the issue,” Sainz said. “Not so happy that we cannot explain the issue very well. So we need to keep digging.”