Nico Rosberg receives 5-place grid penalty after practice crash

2016 Austrian Grand Prix third practice

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Nico Rosberg will receive a five place grid penalty after his accident in final practice this morning.

The team have confirmed that a full new gearbox unit will need to be fitted to his car for the qualifying session as they fight to be ready in time to take part.

That means even if he is able to qualify fastest, he will only be able to start in sixth position at best, putting a dent in his chances for victory this weekend.

2016 Austrian Grand Prix

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    Chris Turner
    Being pelted by rain on his first visit to an F1 race at the 1998 British Grand Prix wasn't enough to dim Chris's passion...

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    27 comments on “Nico Rosberg receives 5-place grid penalty after practice crash”

    1. Quickly everyone, back to the predictions page!

      1. Exactly! Had him up for pole.

        1. o.O

          In the predictions here, does pole mean the fastest man in Q or the one that starts first on the grid?

      2. @glynh ahahaha that’s exactly what I did as soon as I saw it!

      3. Ha ha exactly what I did!

    2. Maybe this race won’t be so boring after all…

      1. How is a Hamilton borefest interesting?

        He will ditch the ultra softs early and cruise to victory on (super) softs

        1. And win the DOTW as well for no reason, probably…

          1. The only way for Hamilton to win Dotw is IF he Jumps out of the car saves A baby and wins the race. No baby then IT must be his.

        2. My apologies. This comment was written before qualifying. I did not expect Hamilton to get pole position, because he is usually not very good at this track. @paeschli

    3. What a week for Hamilton!

    4. What a curved ball. Hamilton should win easy now…

      But there will be epic fighting with Vettel and Rosberg moving through the pack, trying to overtake Red Bulls .. And if we get a good thunderstorm… Omg.

      1. I am not sure about him winning easily. The long term pace of Mercedes here is somewhat questionable given the tyre management of the car.

    5. I’d like to see Rosberg do well from this set back. He’s not demonstrated much flare in coming back from set backs yet to be honest. Winning from the front, picking up clean wins while his team mate is having a mix of bad form and bad luck is going to leave a potential drivers championship with doubters of him deserving it. But he is driving well this season (mostly), if he can pull this back to still make the podium then I think that will answer a lot of critics that he can race.

      1. People will always doubt him. Hamilton could drive badly and class the bad driving as a technical issue. Rosberg is winning if he wins a title he will deserve it.

        Hamilton always will push him he is an amazing driver but if he loses this year then in 2016 Rosberg would have been better. Long way to go though.

    6. WilliamB (@william-brierty)
      2nd July 2016, 12:34

      Hamilton still needs to beat Raikkonen, and he didn’t manage it in FP3. First pole for the Finn since Mangy-Cours 2008?

      1. This is what I put my money on :)

      2. Räikkönen will falter and spoil the opportunity, so Vettel will be on pole.

        1. Vettel can’t be on pole. 5 grid penalty.

    7. Easy win for Hamilton and for sure DOTW. Even if no one challenges him.

      1. We’re not even waiting until the race and DOTW results are in before the Hamilton bashing begins now then?

    8. Clearly the Harmonics of the kerbs are perfect! This is a Harmonic failure problem if ever I have seen one!

      1. Softer suspension should help remedy for the poor curb layout….

      2. It’seems great. Stay on track you will not hit the yellow curbs. Monaco has barriers so did Canada and Baku and in a few ripped wheels off there but no issue. All the drivers fault if the drivers hit the curbs and break their suspension. Stay in the white lines if you don’the and crash, tough luck.

      3. My thought exactly. Looked like the right rear on NO bumps responded (possibly out of phase) with left rear bouncing on yellow curb. Could also be right rear was predamaged on a right side yellow curb, if there is one. Still resonance was the root cause.

    9. Two grid penalties and that too for the only two drivers who can take the challenge to Hamilton. The championship lead of Rosberg is highly likely to come down.

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