Nico Rosberg has conceded that he 'deserved' the same ten-place grid penalty this weekend in France as that handed to
Lewis Hamilton following the Canadian Grand Prix.
Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton both crashed out in Montreal, with the latter slamming into the back of Ferraris
Kimi Raikkonen at the exit of the pit lane. Rosberg collected Hamilton in a similar vein just seconds later.
"It was just unfortunate really that I didn't expect the red light and that's it. It is a new situation and we have seen many people go through it because it is a new rule," said the
Williams man.
"In the pit stop there are a lot of things you have to do and I just I didn't think of that. When you don't expect something it takes a while to react to new situations.
"At the end of the day, if you just look at my case, I didn't do anything to anybody else, because Lewis was already out of the race anyway, so that would be a bit unfair.
"But you have to look at the whole picture. Me and Lewis did the same thing, more or less so, if he deserved to get a ten places, then I think I deserve to get that too, unfortunately."
Asked if it will change his approach to the race now at Magny Cours, Nico added that it will 'definitely' have an influence on his weekend.
"It is going to be very difficult to improve many qualifying positions as I get 10 positions and if I make it into Q3 I am more or less going to be last anyway," he explained. "It does make the approach quite different.
"We need to think about trying to pass people, trying to not have so much understeer when I am running right behind people and to be able to pass into turn five. There are all these things you have to think about and also to compromise your qualifying for that."
Rosberg has had a disappointing run of late with incidents in the last two events. But despite the extra handicap this weekend he believes it is still very important he shows strong pace.
