Ocon defends Zandvoort overtake on Albon but slams F1 restart rule that wiped out his gain

Esteban Ocon has defended his disputed overtake on Alexander Albon during the opening lap of the Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort, while criticising the Formula 1 regulation that stripped him of the position he gained before the race was red-flagged.

Chaos broke out on lap one of a damp Zandvoort circuit when Max Verstappen crashed out and Gabriel Bortoleto spun 360 degrees. As yellow flags flew, Ocon re-accelerated faster than Albon at the end of the yellow-flag zone, crossing the start/finish line to claim 13th place. Albon was furious, telling his team on the radio: “I’m sorry, but what Esteban did is crazy. He’s overtaking me in the middle of the crash.”

Ocon, however, was unapologetic. “I overtook Alex, yeah, but I had the right, because it was green,” the Haas driver said after the race. The problem, as Ocon sees it, was what happened next: under current F1 rules, the grid for a second start following a red flag is set using the classification at the end of lap one, meaning his overtake counted for nothing.

“What was a big shame is that you have to take all these risks,” Ocon said. “You’re playing with either getting a penalty or not. I was not having a penalty, but it was very tight, because I just passed him when it was green. And then they put you back at the race start. If that was 20 metres earlier, then I was having the place. But we still raced for one-and-a-half sectors. The red flag only came after Turn 5. So I should have started in front of Alex — because that changed my race.”

Ocon spent the early stages of the restarted race stuck behind Albon before pitting on lap 16 in search of clear air. He was running 14th when a power unit failure ended his afternoon on lap 53.

The Frenchman also acknowledged that strategy could have been handled differently, noting Fernando Alonso’s strong tactical call during the race, though he conceded replicating it may not have been straightforward given tyre degradation concerns.

Ocon reserved his sharpest criticism for the rule itself, arguing that modern F1 timing technology makes the current system unnecessary. “We are not going to believe that in Formula 1 we don’t have timing loops every 20 metres,” he said. “It’s a very old-school rule, really.” He added that he had raised the issue on the radio during the race, pushing for a more up-to-date classification to be used when setting the second-start grid — a call that went unheeded.