Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsFormula 1

Verstappen crash due to lack of experience - Massa

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Felipe Massa says Max Verstappen's crash in the Monaco Grand Prix showed the dangers of the Toro Rosso driver's lack of experience.

Verstappen hit the rear of Romain Grosjean's Lotus at high speed approaching Ste Devote, breaking his front left suspension and suffering a heavy impact against the wall. Verstappen was later penalised for the collision despite claiming Grosjean had brake tested him, and Massa says it's the sort of incident that shouldn't be overlooked just because nobody was injured.

"I would say what for me was pretty dangerous was the accident with Verstappen," Massa said. "He's supposed to get a penalty for what he did. So he just braked behind, much later and what happened was very dangerous.

"So it shows that maybe experience counts in Formula One, and I think to teach about this type of accident they need to control better because it was very dangerous. So he was lucky that he was not hurt, because he could have been very hurt by what happened."

With Verstappen blaming Grosjean for brake testing him, Massa says he was too far behind to even attempt a move.

"To be honest he was not even in a position to overtake. He was not even near to go alongside, he was behind. So to be honest it was too much what happened."

And Massa says he may bring up his concerns with the FIA. Asked by F1i if it is something he will raise as a senior driver, Massa replied:"Well with this type of mistakes, yes.

"It was very dangerous for him. He's 17, so if he's hurt everybody would talk about it. 'Why did they give a licence to a guy who is 17 and he's doing that?' But he's not hurt, everybody's happy, so I think they need to look at things in a better way."

Click here for a gallery of Max Verstappen's crash with Romain Grosjean during the Monaco Grand Prix

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.