Like Nigel Mansell and many more before, yesterday Max Verstappen learned that hanging on to someone's exhaust pipes in Monaco is the easy bit, it's passing that is the problem.

For lap after lap after lap the Dutchman, aware that Lewis Hamilton's tyres were "dead", sought a way to get past the Briton, knowing that in clear air he could pull ahead of his hard tyres and eventually negate the 5s time penalty meted out to him following his unsafe release earlier.

When the Red Bull driver finally made his move, at the Nouvelle Chicane, the two cars touched, and while Hamilton was forced to cut the chicane both were able to continue.

Investigating the incident after the race the stewards opted to take no further action.

"I was trying to get ahead of Lewis because I knew that if I would get ahead I could drive off, because we were much faster and his tyres were destroyed, so he had no grip," Verstappen told reporters.

"I was trying everything I could," he admitted. "Around here, being in the dirty air for so long, within half a second, it's really hard because in the high-speed corners you're always sliding a lot and trying to keep it between the walls.

"But I enjoyed it," he grinned. "Of course it's a shame to finish fourth, but myself I had a fun race."

Asked about the time penalty, which awarded due to the fact he could have avoided contact with Bottas in the pitlane, he admitted: "It fired me up...

"As soon as I heard the penalty I was pushing Lewis, because initially he was driving so slow," he continued. "Then I heard the penalty, so I just kept pushing him, then of course he had to push and he destroyed his tyres. So that was my only way of trying to get by.

"He was so slow in Turns 5 and 6 that we had a lot more," he added. "It's easy to say that now but I felt we had a lot more pace. Lewis was clearly on the wrong tyre."

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