Haas’s Kevin Magnussen launched a scathing attack on Fernando Alonso after the pair tangled in qualifying at Monza. The McLaren driver had attempted to repass Magnussen at turn one during Q2 and in doing so both their laps were compromised.

“He thought he could overtake into turn one, but I’d rather hang myself,” said Magnussen. “I’m not going to let him past me and sacrifice my own lap. No way. He thinks he’s God, but no way.”

Alonso had been going slowly on his warm-up lap and Magnussen had passed him on the run to Parabolica, but rather than backing off to create a gap, the Spaniard then caught him at the end of the straight and attempted to pass round the outside through the Rettifilo chicane. Alonso had to ride the kerbs and Magnussen had to take evasive action to avoid a collision. Both drivers failed to get out of Q2 as a result. Alonso, who will leave F1 after this season, laughed at the time, saying: “Magnussen wants to race,” and went further afterwards.

Magnussen said: “He came to me after qualifying and laughed to my face. Just outright disrespectful. I can’t wait for him to retire. I think we know Fernando is a bit of an opportunist. We’ve seen that quite a few times in his career with his teams as well, trying different things. Didn’t always work out and it didn’t work out today. He talks about his laps being divine and what not, he literally thinks he’s a god. It’s quite amusing.”

Zak Brown, McLaren’s CEO, confronted the Haas team principal, Guenther Steiner, in the pit lane afterwards. Alonso said he had no comment on Magnussen’s words but he did put his side of the incident. “At the last moment inside the Parabolica he decided to fill the gap I was opening with the car in front and we started the lap together,” he said. “You arrive into turn one together and it was not a very clever move.” The stewards investigated but chose to take no action on the incident.