BARCELONA, Spain -- George Russell said Max Verstappen's move on him felt deliberate and suggested the four-time world champion is a bad example for kids watching Formula 1.
Verstappen drove into the side of Russell's car in the closing moments of the race after being asked to let the Mercedes driver back past, following an incident several laps earlier.
It was unclear whether Verstappen had driven into Russell intentionally or if he had attempted to let the Mercedes back past and then overtake again and simply misjudged the corner.
Russell was in no doubt which of those it was.
"It felt very deliberate, to be honest," Russell said after the race. "It's something that I've seen numerous times in sim racing and on iRacing. Never have I seen it in a Formula 1 race. So that was something new.
"It's a bit of a shame because Max is clearly one of the best drivers in the world. But maneuvers like that are just totally unnecessary and sort of lets him down. It's a shame for all the young kids looking up, aspiring to be Formula 1 drivers.
"So, as I said, I don't know what he was thinking. In the end, I'm not going to lose sleep over it because I ultimately benefited from those antics."
When asked if Verstappen should have been disqualified, Russell said: "Honestly, I need to look back on it. If it was truly deliberate, then absolutely. Because you cannot deliberately crash into another driver.
"We're putting our lives on the line. We're fortunate the cars are as safe as they are these days, but we shouldn't take it for granted. As I said, it's down to the stewards to determine if it's deliberate or not."
When told about Russell's comments when he arrived in the written media pen after, Verstappen simply said: "I'll bring some tissues next time".
On top of the penalty, stewards handed Verstappen three penalty points on his super license -- which leaves the Dutchman one point away from a race ban.
Verstappen has 11 points on his super license in total, with F1's rules stating that 12 in a 12-month period will result in a single-race suspension.
Two of Verstappen's 11 points will expire when they become 12 months old on June 30, meaning Verstappen must avoid any penalties over the next two races in Canada and Austria in order to gain extra breathing room for the rest of the season.
Nico Rosberg, the 2016 world champion and now a pundit for Sky Sports, said Verstappen should have been black-flagged and disqualified for what looked to him like intentional retaliation for the earlier contact.
When watching the footage back in the cool down room, the top three drivers could barely believe their eyes.
Charles Leclerc: "Oh my god."
Oscar Piastri: "Yikes."
Lando Norris: "I've done that before ... in Mario Kart."
Verstappen, meanwhile, did not want to reference the incident directly.
"Does it matter [if contact with George was intentional]?" he said to Sky Sports. "I prefer to speak about the race than just one single moment.
"We are way too slow any way to fight for the title, I think that was clear again today.
"We tried to do a three-stop," he continued. "I thought it was quite good and it was quite racy, and we also needed it because we had quite a bit of degradation on the tires.
"I think that was good but unfortunately the safety car came out at the end and we basically ran out of tires and the hard tire was clearly not the right tire.
"When you only have six laps to go everyone can go flat out and I was severely grip limited on the hard."