Christian Horner talks about Lewis Hamilton’s late pit-stop at Turkish GP

Red Bull boss Christian Horner believes rivals  Mercedes was forced into an “inevitable” pit stop for Lewis Hamilton due to the “dangerous” nature of his tyres during the Turkish Grand Prix.

After extending his stint for 50 laps on balding intermediate rubber, Hamilton pitted for a new set of the same compound with eight laps remaining and was failed to mount a challenge on Sergio Perez or Charles Leclerc for an unlikely podium.

The seven-time regaining champion was frustrated with the late call to pit and asked by Sky Sports F1 for his views on the Mercedes’ strategy, Horner said:

“I am not on their pit wall so obviously difficult to comment but it sounded like Lewis overruled the team.

“At one point you think he is going to get to the end and from what we could see, those tyres were looking dangerous so it was inevitable he was going to have to pit.

“At the point that they pitted, that was to our maximum advantage because at that point you could see Charles as well, the tyres overheated and blistered quite badly and then the pace was lost.

“For us, the crucial moment was for when to pit Checo. We could have left him out to keep holding Lewis, [but] we decided to pit him to make sure we had track position because we didn’t believe that those tyres would make it to the end of the race.”

Checo on Podium for the first time since French Grand Prix

Sergio Perez reached the podium for the first time since the French Grand Prix and at one stage came out on top in a wheel-to-wheel battle with Hamilton after a breathtaking sequence of corners.

“I mean he raced Lewis just as hard as Max does. You can see at [Turn 14] they’re going wheel to wheel and he actually ended up in the pit lane!” said Horner as he watched the incident.

“He [Perez] was on the other side of the bollard, Lewis ran him out there, and then it’s a drag race down the start-finish straight and he just… made it stick – so a great move by him.”