Red Bull Racing Formula 1 boss Christian Horner believes that it was inevitable that Max Verstappen and Lando Norris would end up in an incident after battling for the lead at several recent races.

The pair made contact in the late stages of the Austrian GP after Verstappen thwarted several earlier attempts to get past, leaving Norris complaining that the Dutchman was moving in the braking area.

The touch left both men with rear punctures and put Norris out of the race, while Verstappen managed to salvage fifth after stopping for a new tyre, despite picking up a 10-second penalty that in the end made no difference to his result.

“I think it’s inevitable given how close they’ve been racing the last few weeks,” said Horner of the contact. “It’s a shame. Lando was already on four [track limits] strikes. He was probably going to get a five-second penalty anyway. And it was a racing incident.

“I thought it was a bit harsh that Max got a 10-second penalty. His race had already been damaged by the puncture that he picked up.”

Horner believes that Norris’s attacking mood was in part a reaction to the previous day’s sprint, when he passed Verstappen at Turn 3 only to lose out not only to the Dutchman but also his McLaren own team mate Oscar Piastri at the following corner.

“I think Max is a hard racer,” he said. “And they know that. I think Lando was trying to make up for yesterday, and it was inevitable, you could see this building perhaps for a couple of races, that at some point there was going to be something close between the two of them.

“He was getting his elbows out. Probably a bit of a hangover from yesterday. Max passed him without DRS down into Turn 4, and then he got mugged by his teammate.

“So there’s probably a little bit of a hangover of that. But it was a shame, because we had everything under control today. And I think the final pit stop put Lando back into contention, and then with the advantage on tyre that he had, that was enough to get him into the DRS.” 

Horner was adamant that Norris wouldn’t have caught Verstappen in the final stint without the pit stop delay, despite having a new tyre advantage.

“The first part of the race was going very well,” said Horner. “We pulled out a six-second gap I think in the first stint on the medium tyre, everything was under control. On the hard tyre, the temperatures with the cloud cover a bit lower, we still got up to an eight-second lead at one point. By the time they’d gone through the traffic, it was about six-and-a-half.

“We then pitted on the same lap as McLaren, and there was a sticking left rear nut, and the gun man just had to go on it twice. I think it was six-second stop, we lost four seconds, and that then put Lando on a fresh set of mediums versus a scrubbed set for Max, he got that new tyre advantage.

“Had they gone out six seconds apart, he’d have probably closed the gap, but I think we’d have had enough to manage it in those final laps.”

Looking at the positives Horner added: “The pace of the car has been very strong, we’ve had two poles, he’s led all but nine laps of the race, the sprint race yesterday. He’s extended his lead in the championship. We’ve extended our lead, I think, in the constructors’ championship. So despite not getting the win, it’s not been totally disastrous.”