Hulkenberg blasts ‘nasty’ Magnussen after Hungary clash

Nico Hulkenberg has labelled rival Kevin Magnussen as ‘the most unsporting driver on the grid’ after the duo clashed while disputing 11th place in the latter stages of Sunday’s race in Hungary.

The flashpoint occurred with nine laps to go when Hulkenberg attempted to pass Magnussen around the outside of Turn 2 and was pushed wide onto the grass.

The stewards launched an immediate investigation into the incident and ultimately decided to give Magnussen a five-second time penalty for “forcing another driver off the track”, dropping him from P11 to P13.

But during post-race TV interviews Hulkenberg, who retired, felt the need to confront the Dane.

"I congratulated him for being the most unsporting driver of the whole grid once again,” said the German.

"When it comes to racing, he's just nasty.

"Hard defending is fine but when he does this, it's just ruthless and sending people into the wall.

"What he did there, opening up the steering, making me run wide, it's just being an &!@& basically."

Hulkenberg added that he intends to bring up the incident with race direction, saying: "I'll go and speak to Charlie [Whiting].

"I hear he [Magnussen] got a bit of a penalty, five seconds, but in his mind he won't care about that too much."

The first sign of bad blood between the two drivers came on the opening lap when Magnussen, having seen the Renault driver bang wheels with Haas team mate Romain Grosjean at Turn 1, radioed his team to say "If you can do what Hulkenberg did to Romain, then it's going to be a dirty race."

The stewards investigated the Renault driver over the incident, but decided that no action was necessary.