Hulkenberg cleared over Bahrain GP practice incident with Hamilton

Hamilton, who had already abandoned one attempt at a flying lap, had to abort for a second time when he came upon the slower-moving Renault at the tight left-hander onto Sakhir's back straight, locked up and ran wide.

Hulkenberg was called to the stewards to answer a double charge of impeding and dangerous driving, but they accepted his explanation that he had misjudged the closing speed of the Mercedes.

The stewards' ruling said Hulkenberg had been aware of Hamilton and "moved to left as he approached the corner but due to the differing lines taken by the drivers they arrived at the same point on the track.

"Taking the points made by the drivers into consideration and previous incidents of this type the stewards decided that no further action was necessary."

Hulkenberg told Autosport the incident was a simple case of "bad timing".

"Obviously it's quite uphill there," he said.

"My engineer told me [he was there], I saw him, but he was quite a long way back.

"I just misjudged a bit how fast and how big the speed difference was, and ended up in the wrong timing and the wrong spot.

"I wanted between [Turns] 9 and 10 to be on the inside, to make his way clear. Just got caught out with the speed difference a bit."

Asked if he had apologised to Hamilton, Hulkenberg joked: "Yeah, I fell on my knees!

"It just happens, what can I say? I can't disappear, and I won't."

The near-miss prompted Hamilton to wave his hand at Hulkenberg and declare "these drivers are dangerous" over team radio.

"When you finish a fast lap you do a slower one for the tyres to cool and that's what he was doing," said Hamilton.

"I came up the hill and was easily doing 100km/h faster than he was but he was on the racing line so when I arrived I didn't realise he was going that slow until I was there and had to take evasive action.

"But no one was hurt."