Lewis Hamilton reflected on his Dutch Grand Prix qualifying as “shocking”, saying it all went wrong after his Sergio Perez impeding incident.

A moment down at Turn 9, during the opening Q1 segment at Zandvoort, left Red Bull’s Perez enraged as he felt Hamilton had got in his way despite moving to the far left. “What the f**k is this idiot doing?!” Perez vented over team radio, adding: “For worse than that I’ve been penalised, so I don’t expect any less.”

Lewis Hamilton laments ‘shocking’ Dutch GP qualifying

Lewis Hamilton in his Mercedes race gear facing away from the camera.

Additional reporting by Sam Cooper

The stewards swiftly announced a post-session investigation into potential impeding from Hamilton, who later went on to be knocked out in Q2 in the first race weekend back after the summer shutdown.

“I did absolutely do my best to try and be as far out of the way as possible. It just didn’t work,” Hamilton told media including PlanetF1.com after his qualifying elimination.

Key talking points after a dramatic Dutch GP qualifying

Hamilton expanded on that incident when speaking to Sky F1, calling his qualifying “shocking” and claiming that following that Perez moment, it was all downhill from there.

“Yeah, it was a pretty shocking session,” he said.

“But these things happen. What can I say, it’s done now. Definitely doesn’t feel good.

“It all went badly from the moment that situation with Perez happened. I did my best to get out of the way. I was as far to the left as possible, but just timing was bad.”

Asked if that put him off as of his next lap, as it was suggested to him that it was not a very tidy one, Hamilton replied: “It’s a domino effect probably. From that moment it just went from bad to worse.”