Alonso should have had same penalty as Magnussen – Palmer

2017 Belgian Grand Prix

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Jolyon Palmer remains convinced Fernando Alonso should have been penalised for pushing him off the track during the Belgian Grand Prix.

The Renault driver said the incident was comparable to Kevin Magnussen forcing Nico Hulkenberg off in Hungary, for which Magnussen was given a time penalty.

“To be honest I don’t understand why [Alonso] didn’t get a penalty,” said Palmer in Monza.

“We had two corners previously of hard racing, just about gave each other room both ways. I’ve even seen it on the onboard afterwards and he’s clearly just looking at my car and drives me off the road.”

“I don’t really see the difference between that and Magnussen’s one on Nico in Hungary. So I think we need to see why there’s no consistency there.”

Spa looked like being Palmer’s strongest weekend of the year by far until a car problem in Q3 meant he picked up a gearbox change penalty.

“I was feeling really good the whole weekend,” said Palmer. “We had no issues, which was nice, until qualifying.”

“But then the problem with the gearbox penalty is I should have been seventh on the grid, instead I qualified tenth. But then you get the extra five places on top. Then you’re in Q3 so you had to start on the used tyres from Q2, everyone around you starts on new tyres.”

“We also set the car up to be quick in qualifying, which it was, but that meant we didn’t have the top speed for the guys around us. So overtaking was pretty hard and it was a bit of a slog in the race.”

2017 Belgian Grand Prix

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    Keith Collantine
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    8 comments on “Alonso should have had same penalty as Magnussen – Palmer”

    1. He’s not wrong.

    2. He truly has lost it. If you watched their battle for a lap, Palmer pushed Alonso to the outside at Les Combes to the point (go watch it closely) where Alonso was also outside forced off the track with all four wheels. I agree it’s dirty of Alonso to just cruise him out of the track, but he asked for it. If Palmer would’ve left space into Les Combes I would’ve agreed with Palmer completely but the guy did the same thing 10 seconds earlier. Palmer was unlucky that Turn 10 had that small piece of grass.

      I think the stewards saw the whole battle and thought ”fine, both at fault, no FI drama shenanigans? Pass this one”.

    3. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
      31st August 2017, 22:18

      He pushed Alonso a little wide, but only onto the kerb. Alonso overreacted a little by going a little wider than he needed to. Alonso then did the same back to him, but not only that. At the next corner, Alonso pushed him right off the track and Palmer had little choice but to drive onto the artificial grass without contacting Alonso. This could have resulted in something far worse. Both times Palmer got forced wide, he had artificial grass on his side whereas Alonso didn’t and Palmer didn’t force him to go quite as close as Alonso did both times. I see no reason why Alonso shouldn’t have picked up at leased a small penalty for this.

    4. The rule tends to be quite simple in the eyes of the stewards – providing you take the racing line you can push your rival off on the outside as much as you like. Deviate from the line and force them off, and you’re in trouble.

      Alonso did go a little bit off the ‘normal’ racing line in order to push Palmer wide, but it can’t have been more than 40-50cm off line. A steward in a bad mood could have given him a penalty for it, but… I’d say he was just about inside the rules, as he was so close to a normal line he could have got away with saying ‘that was my normal line’…

      1. Exactly. That’s the big difference between the Kmag and Hulk incident.

    5. Its easy. Alonso is driving his best race ever when he goes off track. Kevin is just a reckless rookie.

      1. I agree with Pal, Alo pushed him wide similar to mag/hul, and this is regardless alo’s was on his as always best ever.

    6. He might be pushing you out of your seat too, boy.

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