Esteban Ocon defends controversial move on Alex Albon, bemoans F1 rule

Esteban Ocon has defended his controversial overtake on Alexander Albon in the Dutch Grand Prix and criticised the Formula 1 rule that meant he was pegged back for the second start.

As Max Verstappen crashed out and Gabriel Bortoleto endured a 360-degree spin on lap one at a slightly damp Zandvoort track, an opportunistic Ocon re-accelerated faster than Albon at the end of the yellow-flag zone to grab 13th place – which the Anglo-Thai driver disapproved of – shortly after crossing the start/finish line.

“I’m sorry, but what Esteban did is crazy,” Albon ranted on the radio. “He’s overtaking me in the middle of the crash.”

While the Williams driver wasn’t asked about the move in his post-race media session, Ocon was – and insisted he’d done nothing wrong.

“I overtook Alex, yeah, but I had the right, because it was green,” the Haas racer said, before pointing out the grid for the second start was established based on the classification at the end of lap one, meaning his overtake was null and void.

“What was a big shame is that you have to take all these risks, you know?” Ocon added. “You’re playing with either getting a penalty or not. I was not having a penalty, but it was very tight, because I just passed him when it was green. And then they put you back at the race start.

“It’s been like that forever, but… Really, if that was 20 metres earlier, then I was having the place. But we still raced, like, for one-and-a-half sector. The red flag only came after Turn 5, you know? So, we passed sector one, and we were getting into sector two. So, I should have started in front of Alex – because that changed my race.”

Esteban Ocon, Haas F1 Team

Photo by: Simon Galloway / LAT Images via Getty Images

Ocon spent the first part of the race stuck behind Albon and pitted quite early, on lap 16, in a bid to find free air. He was 14th again when he retired on lap 53 due to a power unit issue.

“After that, obviously, there’s a lot of things that maybe we could have done differently, with strategy, etc,” the Frenchman admitted. “Fernando [Alonso] did a really, really good strategy, I don’t think we could have done the same one without degradation. But there are things that we can look into to do a better job.”

Ocon is adamant that a more up-to-date classification could have been taken into account when setting up the second start of the race.

“We are not going to believe that in Formula 1 we don’t have timing loops every 20 metres, you know? It’s a very old-school rule, really,” he continued.

“I said it on the radio, let’s not make Alex go in front again at the restart. Because that should not be the case. And for some reason I felt it, that they were going to put him in front again. They still take the line, which is like two kilometres back. It shouldn’t be like that, it should be the last moment.”

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– The Motorsport.com Team