Schumacher Laments Montoya's Tunnel Vision

Michael Schumacher blamed Juan Pablo Montoya for the Monaco Grand Prix crash that ended his hopes of a record sixth win in six races on Sunday.

Schumacher had hoped to become the first Formula One driver to win the year's first six races but the dream vanished when he collided with Montoya's Williams as they were in formation behind the Safety Car in the tunnel.

Contact was made after Schumacher braked suddenly and his Ferrari emerged into the daylight with the front left wheel dangling uselessly and a shattered nose cone.

Montoya blasted the German for being "blind or stupid" after they collided at the San Marino Grand Prix last month but this time it was Schumacher who questioned the Colombian's judgement.

"I don't think anyone should accuse him (Montoya) of anything intentional," the six times World Champion told Germany's RTL television. "But rather it was just a bit stupid of him to wrongly estimate the situation that led to a collision.

"No doubt about it that I'm a bit angry, that's logical," Schumacher added. "But in motor racing things happen that you can't predict. You've got to accept that. We've had a lot of good races in the recent past. And now it just went a bit bad for us today."

Senna's Record

Although Schumacher tried to nurse his car back to the pits, it was a hopeless task and his retirement ended for another year his dream of equalling Brazilian Ayrton Senna's record of six Monaco victories.

"The tyres were quite cold. I tried to warm the tyres as well as brakes because we knew the Safety Car was going off," said Schumacher. "This braking and accelerating is the normal way that you do (things) to get your tyres warm.

"And when the Safety Car is in front of you you have a certain margin that you can use. It's just unfortunate and stupid what happened. I haven't really talked with him (Montoya) since Imola about anything and don't believe that I have to talk to him about anything," said the German.

Montoya said Schumacher had accelerated hard and then braked equally hard.

"I moved to the right to try and avoid him and put the car up against the wall so we wouldn't hit and we just touched," said the Colombian.

"If he was braking that hard he should have done it in a different place - not in the middle of the tunnel. It's very hard to judge. I moved off-line to try not to hit him and he came over exactly to where I was. I didn't have anywhere else to go."

Stewards summoned both drivers and team representatives after the race but ruled that the incident required no further action. Schumacher conceded however that even without the accident he would still not have been fast enough to beat Renault's first-time winner Jarno Trulli.

"At best, I would have been second today. That was pretty much what we expected," he said. "We thought we might have some problems here today and they did in fact emerge."