While admitting that it was wrong of him to blame either of his two drivers for what happened in Istanbul – the fact of the matter is that everyone at Milton Keynes got it into their heads that it was Webber to blame – Horner insisted that Pilbeam shouldn't have been put to the wall either.
Shortly after the Turkish race was over, both Horner and Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko told the media that Pilbeam was instructed to let Webber know that Sebastian Vettel was faster than him and that he should let him pass. Not only the race engineer didn't do that, but he also instructed Webber to use the overtake button to defend against Vettel, as shown in the official video edit of the Istanbul race published by F1's official website.
“Ciaron Pilbeam has taken a bit of flak recently. He had no instruction to tell mark to move out of the way, that is 100 per cent clear. There was no conspiracy trying to get one car past the other or getting one to slow down,” said Horner in a BBC interview, trying to suggest that no team orders were passed onto Webber through his race engineer.
“In the cold light of day it was a racing accident, nothing more, nothing less. It was wrong to blame either driver,” added Horner.
Things between Mark Webber and his team seem to have come back to normal, as the 33-year old Aussie has recently signed a one year extension to his current deal with the Austrian team, keeping him at Milton Keynes until the end of 2011.
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