Gutierrez unhappy with Sainz in Japan

Esteban Gutierrez expressed his annoyance with Carlos Sainz's defensive move on lap 19 of last weekend's Japanese Grand Prix.

The Haas driver qualified tenth and was running consistently in the top ten until his pitstop on lap 11 which sent him to the tail end of the field.

He picked up his race from there and locked himself on to Sainz Toro Rosso, eventually challenging the Spaniard for position at the chicane on lap 19 by diving into the inside of Sainz.

The Spaniard countered the move however and forced the Mexican into a spin.

"I don't think it was fair from his side," explained the Mexican.

"Because he knew that I was going to go deep, he knew that I was going to go inside. I had the space, I had the speed, and he closed the door completely.

"So obviously I had to turn in as well and brake, otherwise I would have crashed into him."

After the mishap, Gutierrez , who is yet to be confirmed at Haas for 2017, remained at the back of the field for pretty much the remainder of the afternoon, ultimately finishing a distant 20th.

"We did a really good start, we were happy with the pace. It was going really well at the beginning, and when we pitted, we came out with a lot of traffic.

"I  don't know what went wrong there. I think we could have done a bit better with the strategy.

"I pushed all the way, it was not the ideal position to be in, and then after the blue flags, it seems like everything went wrong.

"We have to keep pushing, we showed very good pace in qualifying, and we have to carry through to the rest of the season. We have to take the positives, it's not really the race we wanted."

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