David Coulthard has criticised Williams BMW driver Juan-Pablo Montoya’s cavalier (or was it kamikaze?) driving tactics during the Hungarian GP.
David Coulthard has criticised Williams BMW driver Juan-Pablo Montoya’s cavalier (or was it kamikaze?) driving tactics during the Hungarian Grand Prix.
The Colombian ran off the road while trying to defend seventh place from Coulthard’s team-mate, Kimi Raikkonen, on Sunday. But in the process, vital aerodynamic components were ripped from Montoya’s car. As the Colombian’s FW24 bounced over the gravel, his car was rendered almost undriveable on the high-downforce circuit.
The Colombian had a disappointing qualifying session, in which he was a second slower than team-mate Ralf Schumacher. And, according to Coulthard, Montoya’s inferred status as heir-apparent to Michael Schumacher is misplaced.
“There’s all this hype about Montoya… the guy is very quick and I think his qualifying earlier in the year showed that,” said the Scot, who recovered from a poor starting position to take fifth in the race.
“But whenever it comes to wheel-to-wheel racing, there’s an incident. With me, we crashed and we both lost the opportunity to score points in Nurburgring.
“In Hungary, Kimi launched a fantastic passing manoeuvre at him and what did Montoya do? He threw himself off the circuit because he’s got this inability to just accept that he’s been passed.
“What he’d rather do is either go off the track or take both cars out of the race and that to him seems to be okay. It is as if he finds it acceptable to drive that way, because he’s not giving up his place.
“Sometimes you’ve got to just give up your position,” Coulthard said. “People say that Montoya has big balls, but maybe it’s a case of big balls and a small brain.”