Jacques Villeneuve. Photo via Creative Commons/Flickr user The Freewheeling Daredevil.
Former F1 driver and current NASCAR Sprint Cup driver Jacques Villeneuve spoke out on Lewis Hamilton's treatment in the Monaco Grand Prix, where he was penalized for broadsiding Felipe Massa and Pastor Maldonado. Villeneuve says F1 drivers should be allowed to race each other with less worry about pentalty for such incidents.
Why? Villeneuve wants to see more aggressive driving, which he thinks would make for better racing. He says the crashes that result from too-aggressive driving are penalty enough.
Villeneuve certainly applies this theory to his own driving, though we don't think Max Papis or Brian Scott would agree that the penalties they suffered at Villeneuve's hands were appropriate--or that Villeneuve's resulting third-place finish after bashing both off the track at Road America in June was a sufficient "penalty."
Ironically, Villeneuve had these words of wisdom to offer in defense of his interpretation: "That's racing, too bad, you have to let the drivers race. What you don't want is people putting other people in the wall on purpose, or being just stupid. That's what you have to avoid and that's what you should get penalized on."
As Max Papis said from his wrecked car, "Thank you, Jacques. Good job."
