Valtteri Bottas criticises Charles Leclerc for "unnecessary" move in Hungarian GP

Bottas suffered damage to his front right endplate following the Ferrari of Leclerc clipping the Mercedes. The Finn tried to keep going, but a few laps later, he was forced to pit and drop all the way down to P20.

"I was on the outside of (Max) Verstappen, so I tried to brake late, tried to go for the outside," Bottas said. "He braked late as well, so I had a bit of a lock-up, so that caused a bit of a flat spot, so going into Turn 2, I had some understeer because of that.

"But it was all OK. Lewis (Hamilton) was also on the outside, but there was still room for two of us, maybe left a bit too much because he could carry good speed into Turn 3.

"We were side-by-side, for sure he didn't leave any room for me, so that compromised my exit out of Turn 3, I had to lift. Then on the way to Turn 4, Charles came on the right-hand side and suddenly swept across, and took my front wing.

"So that was it really, it compromised the race, and losing big chunks of time in the beginning, then stopped early, going through traffic all through the race, that was really the story."

Bottas drove a solid race and climbed 12 places from the rear of the grid and finished in eighth-place.