Albon wars with his former team before Nurburgring retirement

It was a race to forget for Alex Albon at the Nurburgring on Sunday.

After dropping to seventh from his fifth-place starting spot, the Thai Red Bull man pitted early and came back through the field but came unstuck against both of his former team's cars.

First, he damaged his tyres when he locked up trying to pass Pierre Gasly's Alpha Tauri heading into the first corner, forcing the Italian Grand Prix winner off the track. Then attempting to pass Daniil Kvyat in the other Alpha Tauri, Albon looked to have the move done when the Russian ran deep into the final chicane, only for Albon to slam the door shut and take off Kvyat's front wing. That move earned him a five-second penalty, which he served when replacing his flat-spotted tyres sustained in the earlier Gasly incident.

But after picking up debris in his sidepods, puncturing a radiator, Albon was forced into retirement as was left to watch on as team-mate Max Verstappen claimed another podium finish.

He said: "The pace in the car was good today so it’s a shame to have a result like this and not see where we could have finished the race. I had a lock-up avoiding contact on the first lap which meant I had to pit really early because I had severe vibrations from a flat spot on the tyre.

"I don’t really know what happened with Daniil and I need to watch it back. I think he may have run a little wide into the chicane when we did the re-start and I guess it was a bit of misjudgment from my side.

"After that, the team saw the temperatures rising and I was asked to box and then retire the car. It initially looked like a power unit issue from the data but the team investigated and found that some debris had pierced the radiator system which led to the rising temperatures.

"It is definitely not the way I wanted to end the weekend as the car felt good, but onwards and upwards and I’m looking forward to Portimao in a few weeks’ time.”