SPA-FRANCORCHAMPS, Belgium -- Sergio Perez has hit back at Esteban Ocon after his Force India teammate claimed Perez had put his life at risk in an incident at the Belgian Grand Prix.
The Force India drivers collided twice in Sunday's race, once on the opening lap and again on lap 30 as they battled for position. Both drivers emerged from the first clash unscathed and were willing to accept it as a racing incident, but Ocon was left furious by the second which saw Perez squeeze him towards the concrete wall lining the track on the run down to Eau Rouge.
After the race, a furious Ocon claimed his teammate had put both drivers' lives at risk and claimed Perez had acted in an unprofessional way during the second incident. After reading those quotes on Sunday night, Perez took to Twitter in order to respond.
"I'm just very disappointed to see his comments regarding that I want to kill him or whatever," Perez said. "I'm not that type of guy and I'm not going to make any stupid comments, I just want to tell you the truth and move on.
"We are all professional and I could have said many things in the past but that's not the type of guy that I am. I want to move on and I will give the best driving ever in the next eight races for my team. They will deserve that and they will see the best from me in my career. I look forward to that."
Offering his side of the argument on both incidents, Perez was willing to accept the blame for the first incident but said Ocon should have been more patient ahead of the second.
"First, at the start, I didn't select the right engine mode for the start and therefore I had 50 percent less power -- and the proof of that is that I had the red light flashing behind my car because I don't have any deployment of the energy," Perez explained. "So I had at least 50 percent less power than the other cars.
"I did quite a good start, I managed to get ahead of Hulkenberg, but then everybody was getting ahead of me because I had 50 percent less power. I looked in my mirrors out of Turn 1, and I was ahead of the group, but then Hulkenberg goes to the left and I'm quite surprised to see him there because he was quite far behind, and then I look at my mirrors again and he's just side-by-side with me. So I was so focused on him that I didn't expect Esteban to be there, so when I moved to the right I touched him and that was totally my fault so I'm sorry for that.
"With the second incident I just kept my line. There was no room for two cars, there was just a wall and then my car and we were always going to make to contact. There was no need to do that because he could have waited after Eau Rouge and make the manoeuvre easily."