Mercedes faced trouble with the F1 stewards during the Austrian Grand Prix when Lewis Hamilton drove out of the garage and seemed to hit a wheel jack.
“Mercedes was penalized by the FIA for allowing Lewis Hamilton’s car to be released in a dangerous state during the qualifying session for the Austrian Grand Prix.”
During the session, the Briton had an incident while trying to secure the best starting position for the race at the Red Bull Ring. As he left the Mercedes garage and entered the pit lane, a wheel jack was still attached to his car and was filmed by the TV cameras. The stewards quickly announced that they would investigate the issue after the session ended.
They have now decided that a £4,250 fine for the team is the appropriate penalty.
In an official decision document, they wrote: “Car 44 [Hamilton] was released from the garage in an unsafe manner dragging a jack and an exhaust extractor behind it. The stewards acknowledge that the team immediately informed the driver to stop to prevent any further damage and/or dangerous situation.”
Hamilton received no sporting penalty for the rule breach as he was not responsible for what happened. That meant there was no danger that he would lose fifth place on the grid after earning that slot with his fastest lap of the session.
And Max Verstappen, who took pole position, also avoided a penalty after he too was investigated over a separate matter. The Red Bull racer dominated qualifying but was accused of “driving unnecessarily slowly” at the end of the pit lane during the session.
After reviewing video evidence, the panel of stewards decided that no further action against the Dutchman was necessary. They wrote: “Despite the fact that Car 1 [Verstappen] exited the pits slowly and made up a gap of approximately 14 seconds to the car in front of him, the stewards determine that in this case no other car was directly affected by this in their attempts to set a lap time.
Furthermore, it was observed that other vehicles were also creating gaps on the track at this particular moment. The stewards suggest that a maximum gap time should be imposed during qualifying to avoid situations where drivers are hindered from completing a lap at the end of a session.
Verstappen will be accompanied by Lando Norris on the front row of the grid, as Norris was once again narrowly beaten to pole position by his competitor during this Sprint weekend.
Despite Oscar Piastri setting a lap time that was fast enough for third place, it was invalidated due to a suspected breach of track limits, resulting in the Australian driver being demoted to seventh.
TV replays were not clear about whether the entirety of his McLaren car had crossed the white line that marks the track boundary. Consequently, McLaren has filed a formal complaint challenging the outcome of the session in an attempt to have that lap restored.
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