De Vries on Norris skirmish: 'He came quite late'

Nyck de Vries has shouldered the majority of the blame for his Turn 1 collision with Lando Norris at the Miami Grand Prix, but suggested the Briton was not faultless.

The AlphaTauri locked up under braking and nudged Norris' McLaren wide having dropped numerous places at the start.

De Vries had put a difficult weekend in Azerbaijan the week previous behind him with a strong qualifying effort to reach Q2, but that was undone with another in a long list of errors in his rookie F1 campaign.

Norris sent a stinging barb in de Vries' direction after the incident suggesting he "needs to try braking a little bit earlier".

Giving his own account of the clash, former Mercedes Formula E World Champion de Vries told media, including RacingNews365.com: "Lando had a very good start, he moved to the left and I was close.

"I locked up, my mistake, I locked up both wheels and we touched and ran wide, that's pretty much it."

The incident was placed under review by the FIA race stewards who decided no further action was required.

"Because he came quite late in front of me, already in the braking point, I just couldn't react by applying more pressure - which I did - and then I locked up," added de Vries.

"A shame for both of us."

De Vries went on to finish a place behind Norris in 18th as the pair struggled to make headway into the midfield pack.

But ruling out any lasting effect from the Turn 1 scuffle, he explained: "There was no damage, just the first stint, I had a lot of vibrations on my right front so that compromised my pace a little bit.

"When the gap is that big, it is hard to catch up when there's no Safety Car or something happening."