Max Verstappen labelled his aggressive defensive manoeuvre on Lewis Hamilton was "all good" after turning in an impressive drive to second at the Japanese Grand Prix.
Verstappen held off the charging Hamilton late in the race by getting a good exit out of the final corner so the DRS advantage was not enough to drag the Mercedes close enough on the main straight. Hamilton attempted to pass on the inside of the final chicane on the penultimate lap but Verstappen moved across, forcing Hamilton to take evasive action and bail out across the corner.
When asked if he thought Hamilton had more to lose than he did, Verstappen replied: "To be honest I never really thought about both of those things, I was just doing my race. The car was feeling quite good, I was trying to follow Nico a bit and I think in general we did a great strategy so the car was working well."
After being forced wide by Verstappen, Hamilton complained over radio that the teenager had moved under braking. Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen have made similar complains this season but Verstappen feels there was nothing wrong with the move and pointed out that he was never going to do anything "crazy" with a driver challenging for the title.
"Of course Lewis was closing up a lot and at the end of the race he was pushing me hard. I know he's fighting for the world championship so you're not going to do crazy things, of course, but I think in the end it was all good. I managed to keep my tyres alive and to come home in second. Of course that's also a great result for myself and I think also one of my best races so far, but also for the team and the constructors' it was a very good result."
"You [can] see him coming in the mirrors. Already on the laps before he was closing in quite a bit there. I saw already out of Turn 14 that he had a good exit so I was using a bit of energy and defended into the last chicane, so all good."
Hamilton refused to dwell on the incident in the post-race press conference, simply saying: ""Well, it doesn't really matter now. It has happened and we move forwards."