The more I read about the Russian Grand Prix penalty that Lewis Hamilton incurred, the more it became clear that there was a miscommunication between the team and Lewis. Lewis radioed that there was a lot of rubber on the tarmac in the designated are and asked if he could go further down the pit exit. Simple enough.
The point is, finding a piece of asphalt that is not covered with rubber from numerous practice starts is key and Lewis was looking for that when he radioed his team asking if he could go further down pit exit to find some clean asphalt.
The confusion was the team were not aware of how far he had gone down pit edit as director Andrew Shovlin says:
“We hadn’t realised quite how far he was going to go. But it’s really just trying to find a bit of tarmac that’s more like the one that you’re going to get when you do the proper race start.”
“We didn’t see the first one,” he said. “And when we saw the second one, we thought, ‘They’re not going to like that.’
“But we didn’t think it was dangerous. And given the event notes said that it was on the right hand side after the pit exit we thought it might have been ambiguous enough that we would have just got a telling off.
“When we saw the car position, it wasn’t a complete surprise that they didn’t like it. And no doubt there may have been teams who flagged it as much as whether the FIA or the stewards spotted it themselves.”
Contrary to Lewis’s theory that the FIA is “trying to stop me” and they are changing the rules “to keep racing more exciting”, it seems to me a simple directive on location of practice starts to ensure safety and Lewis went beyond that location and was penalized.
You might argue that it hasn’t been that way before but then again, Charlie Whiting was at the helm and Michael Masi is a different person with different concerns. Lewis, finding fresh asphalt, gained an advantage over other drivers who had to use the designated area that had been rubbered in.
For what it is worth, I am struggling to take Lewis’s hint of victimhood onboard from a guy who is poised to break the all-time record in F1 and set to ink a new $120 million contract. Spare me if I fall short of mustering up a tear.
You know who was in favor of rules changes to make F1 more exciting, Lewis Hamilton. back in 2013 said that Sebastian Vettel dominance is making F1 a turn off and that he was looking forward to the 2014 rules change. I guess since he is the one dominating, is no longer an issue
My question is why he got penalised twice for the same thing? My logic would be that he only made one mistake, just that he did it twice. If he wasn’t told it was wrong after the first time how was he meant to know the second time?
On Lewis complaining about being hard done by. My take was that he is psyching himself up as he drives better when he feels that people are against him. So far this year it’s been pretty straightforward. Maybe he’s looking for a bit of spice in his life?
One for each infraction.
I got that bit. It was more that if you make a mistake then they fine you and you learn not to do it again. If you make a mistake, but hear nothing then what’s to stop you making the same mistake again? In the UK I think that if you are caught speeding twice on the same section of road then it can be treated as the same offence: “However, where offences are deemed to have been committed “on the same occasion”, the Court has discretion to impose only the one set of points for two or more offences.”… Read more »
He did two starts and got two penalties. Just because someone from the FIA didn’t run down and tell him not to do it again, doesn’t mean that he shouldn’t get two penalties, the FIA are a bit busy at the pre-race.
All the teams were told about this before the race.
it WAS a little weird, because my understanding from bbc is he didn’t do two starts he did one. They penalized him for starting in the wrong place, and for stopping in the wrong place. But the reason you cant do a start in these places is its not considered safe to have cars stopped there. So it really is two penalties for the same act. Like if you ran someone over and they charged you for murder and attempted murder.
He did do two races starts. Mercedes have said so themselves. This quote from the article above.
I agree Merc said that, I’m just saying the BBC said that wasn’t the case. Merc alao said the penalty was nuts. I wasn’t there so I don’t know who’s right.
well said, good points.
I was surprised they were able to combine the penalties into one pitstop.
I as well, but because they were five second penalties, it makes sense. With the five second, they can either serve is during a pit stop OR it gets tacked on at the end of the race. So what’s the difference between waiting ten seconds in the pits or having ten seconds added on after? If it were two 10 second stop/go penalties, it would be different as that kind of penalty dictates (if not mistaken) that you have to take them within 3 laps of the penalty being given. In that case, they would have to pit twice to… Read more »
I was more surprised about the license points. I didn’t realize Ham Sandwich has been such a bad boy these past 12 months!