Brazilian veteran unmoved as Claire Williams fails to criticise driver
Tuesday 1 April 2014 09:42, UK
Felipe Massa has struck a defiant stance against his failure to heed Williams team orders in the Malaysia GP and insisted he "did the right thing" in not letting Valtteri Bottas overtake him.
Pressed on whether she agreed that Massa had nonetheless failed to carry out their orders, Williams replied: "He didn't ignore them, but both cars were getting really hot at the end of the race and they were both told they needed to make sure they got both cars across the lines rather than overheating them. Valtteri was also told to cool it off as well. "I'm very happy we are ending the race in P7 and 8, which is a great result for Williams. Much better than anything we did last year so I'm happy." Bottas, meanwhile, was keeping his own counsel when quizzed on the brewing intra-team controversy after the race. "I don't want to really comment [about] that. We should really speak in the team first what happened there and what messages they gave to Felipe," he said. And in unsurprising contrast to Massa's point of view, Bottas expressed confidence that he would have been able to overtake Button for sixth had he been able to attack the McLaren. "I think there was a really good chance for me to get Jenson. I was approaching really quickly but, like I said, we need to speak with the team," he added.
