Around three hours after qualifying, the FIA punished Sergio Pérez for his track limit violation in Q2. The Red Bull driver who would not have made it into Q3 without the irregular lap time will have all times in Q3 and the affected time at the end of Q2 deleted. The Mexican will only start the sprint race on Saturday from 13th place.
The commissioners initially didn’t notice the violation of the rules in turn 8, so Pérez was allowed to start in Q3 as usual. However, the violation of the rules was clear, which Red Bull also admitted, so that the commissioners had no choice but to punish the Red Bull driver.
According to the FIA, the team had previously tried to argue that leaving the track at this point was not a clear advantage. However, Pérez was not accused of having an off-track advantage either, but that he drove off the track for no reason – and this wording is used in qualifying in that case.
Red Bull also argued that they took risks and used resources to drive into Q3. “The stewards accept this point. However, when assessing a penalty after a session, this is no different than any other situation,” the stewards said.
In the end, the stewards decided to apply the “usual” penalty and cancel the lap in question in Q2. “However, this would mean that the driver would not have progressed in Q3 and therefore, out of fairness to all other participants, the stewards are ordering that all of the driver’s lap times for Q3 be canceled as well.”
For Pérez, it means that he not only falls back to tenth place, but to 13th place, because before his last attempt he was behind Valtteri Bottas in this position.
Gasly: One position up but missed Q3
Bad luck for Pierre Gasly. Although the AlphaTauri driver is now moving up from eleventh to tenth place, his chance of a better result in Q3 was taken away from him. The Frenchman would actually have made it into the last section without the Pérez time. He does not get any further compensation.
George Russell (Mercedes) is fourth in the sprint ahead of Esteban Ocon (Alpine). The two Haas of Kevin Magnussen and Mick Schumacher move up to positions six and seven. Fernando Alonso (Alpine) is new eighth ahead of Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes).
Behind Gasly, Alexander Albon (Williams) starts in eleventh place ahead of Valtteri Bottas (Alfa Romeo), who is allowed to take up his starting position in the sprint but has to start from the very back in Sunday’s race due to an engine change. Pérez positions himself behind the Finn, the penalty has no effect on all other positions.