Hamilton was left questioning how they could overcome the perilous task of overtaking Verstappen in a conversation with race engineer Carlo Santi. Santi said: "You have overtake and boost on the main straight."

Hamilton replied: “How am I supposed to overtake the Red Bull engine?” And the topic of clipping continued into the cooldown room ahead of the podium ceremony, where Verstappen got his hands on the silverware for his 74th race win.

The Brit said: "You guys have just got too much power on the straights as well. Frickin’ heck... It’s so stupid, the clipping they have." Verstappen said during the exchange: "I mean, I needed it with your cornering... Yeah, that’s true. It really kills the overtaking into Turn 1."

During his post-race press conference, Hamilton made a demand to racing figures, he said: "We had let Max past and the race was done from there. You can’t overtake here. I think it’s something the FIA need to do and it’s just quite bad.

“It’s the silliest thing when you are behind and you have a little bit more power in the slipstream. You should be able to go past that to have a chance to overtake. The engine can go faster. It’s just they have these silly clips.

“It’s the worst engine profile setting that I think they’ve probably ever had in this sport and it doesn’t provide great racing, so today you probably didn’t see much overtaking, unfortunately, because of that. Obviously, the starts were fun, but it’s a very hard track to follow with the thin air and low downforce.

“I gave it everything to try and get close to Max, but maybe they needed… I don’t know if they need to change the last corner because it’s so quick. I don’t know. There could be a change to the track, maybe, to enable us to have a little bit better racing. But everyone having this [clipping] this year just diminishes any opportunity of that.”