Pierre Gasly has been handed a post-race drive-through penalty for driving too quickly under red flag conditions during the Formula 1 Japanese Grand Prix.
The Frenchman was referred to the stewards shortly after he encountered a service vehicle on the Suzuka circuit early in the race.
Carlos Sainz crashed on the opening lap on the run from the hairpin towards Spoon, drawing the Safety Car and ultimately the red flag.
The latter was shown as Gasly reached the scene of the accident for the second time.
He trailed the field after picking up an advertising hoarding on the opening lap, pitting to have that removed and his front wing replaced.
With the field under the control of the Safety Car, Gasly was chasing to catch the back of the train.
As he did so, he encountered a service vehicle at the scene of the Sainz crash.
It was a point heavily criticised by drivers, team bosses, and observers for being wholly inappropriate and unacceptable, especially following the fatal crash of Jules Bianchi at the circuit in 2014.
The reaction from the FIA was to launch an investigation into Gasly, which was heard post-race and resulted in a 20-second time penalty and two penalty points on his licence.
“The Stewards heard from the driver of Car 10 (Pierre Gasly) and team representative and reviewed video and telemetry evidence,” read the stewards’ summary.
“After passing the scene of the incident, car 10 continued under the red flag situation, at speeds which exceeded 200 km/h on multiple occasions, and which reached 251 km/h at one point.
“The driver conceded that he now understood that there could have been marshals or obstacles on the track and admitted that he was too fast.
“However, in mitigation of penalty, we take into account that although the speed could not by any measure be regarded as “slow” as required in the regulations, it was slower that the maximum speed that could be achieved under these conditions.
“We also take into account the shock the driver experienced on seeing a truck on the racing line in the corner of the incident.”
The Formula 1 Sporting Regulations do not specify a maximum speed for drivers, only that cars are to be driven “slowly” back to the pit lane.
Instead, the penalty has the optics of the FIA looking to pass the buck for sending a recovery vehicle on the track at a dangerous time.
Following Bianchi’s accident, it was noted in the conclusion of the FIA’s own Accident Summary that such an occurrence should never occur.
“It is considered fundamentally wrong to try and make an impact between a racing car and a large and heavy vehicle survivable,” the 2014 document stated.
“It is imperative to prevent a car ever hitting the crane and/or the marshals working near it.”
In this instance, both a heavy recovery vehicle and marshals were on track.
Gasly finished the race 17th, the time penalty dropping him to 18th, the last classified finisher.
Discussion about this post