The Chinese Grand Prix stewards ruled Daniil Kvyat was entirely to blame for his first-lap collision with the McLaren drivers.
The Toro Rosso driver was give a drive-through penalty and handed penalty points on his licence for instigating the collision at turn six with Carlos Sainz Jnr and Lando Norris.Kvyat initially made contact with Sainz’s car. That sent his Toro Rosso sideways into Norris, whose car briefly flew into the air. The contact left both McLaren cars damaged, meaning the two drivers had to pit for repairs at the end of the first lap. Kvyat’s car was undamaged and he was able to continue.
The stewards held Kvyat responsible for the collision following an investigation. “The stewards reviewed video evidence and concluded that the driver of car 26, (Daniil Kvyat), lost control of his car at the exit of turn six and hit the cars to his left,” they explained.
“He did this on his own and the stewards determined that he was wholly at fault, causing the collision.”
Kvyat was also given his first two penalty points of the current 12-month period. These are the first points he’s accrued since returning to Formula 1 at the beginning of the season.
This weekend’s race stewards are Tim Mayer, Steve Stringwell, Derek Warwick and Zheng Honghai.
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Peter
14th April 2019, 8:13
Nothing has changed it seems
DAllein (@)
14th April 2019, 9:28
Everyone know it hasn’t.
The problem is RBR doesn’t have drivers to replace Kvyat and Gasli, so they will have to stay patient for several more races, before finally dropping one of them, and reshuffle the rest with reserve-driver Buemi.
(I consider RBR and TR as the same entity in regards to drivers… because it is)
dio
14th April 2019, 8:16
He destroyed their race. It was the first time that a driver hits both drivers of a team and at the same turn! They were very light on him.
GtisBetter (@)
14th April 2019, 8:41
This stewarding is only going downhill. 5 sec would be the right call, though i’d say it was a racing accident. To many guys going into the corner and all that. Wholly to blame is just nonsense.
anon
14th April 2019, 8:55
@passingisoverrated, I would have to agree that, watching the incident back from Sainz’s point of view, the stewards made the wrong decision there.
If anything, Palmer was suggesting on the radio commentary that it looked more like Sainz was trying to avoid Norris as he rejoined the track and ended up being squeezed between Norris and Kvyat. However, with Kvyat having been given a reputation for crashing – even when it wasn’t his fault – he suggested that it was a case of the stewards being predisposed to blame Kvyat and chose to put the blame on him for that incident.
DAllein (@)
14th April 2019, 9:24
Nonsense is allowing this guy to drive.
Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
14th April 2019, 9:48
You seem to base far too much on Kvyat’s history. Ignore his past and just look at this season. He hasn’t been that bad and this was not a poor incident at all, just very unfortunate.
DAllein (@)
14th April 2019, 10:53
I suggest you re-watch the incident.
He had the full track empty to the right of him, he could chose every possible line to navigate safely even with consideration to any possible understeer.
But no, he didn’t JUST understeer and accidentally touch one car, he WAS willingly on the only line, which fully intersected with 2 other cars… and of course when he started to understeer (oops, how surprising!), the only thing he could do – is take out these 2 other drivers.
Sorry, but it is plain stupid not to consider his history.
His driving skills are of kindergarten kid in a leg-pushed toy car… and somehow hoping that suddenly he became F1-grade driver is just laughable.
Nothing from this season tells of any changes. And today’s race actually confirms everything we knew from his previous F1 appearances.
Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
14th April 2019, 11:26
He would no chance be back with the team that said he would never be back if he’s as bad as you are suggesting.
You are most certainly in the minority on this site for thinking Kvyat has made such a big mistake worth this sort of penalty. I can only blame him for it really, but it was very unfortunate and i disagree that he could have done much differently. It didn’t look like anything was going to happen if he didn’t have that oversteer. Plenty of drivers take risks and then find out that they have oversteer.
The consequence of this was much worse and it looked nothing like as risky as what Verstappen did on Sainz and Ricciardo did on Hulkenberg last race for example.
Lenny (@leonardodicappucino)
14th April 2019, 9:50
Great to hear that I’m not the only one who thinks that penalty was absolutely rediculous. +1!
EC (@dutch-1)
15th April 2019, 17:49
When this happened to one of the top 6 drivers, it would have been a “racing incident”. Found it unbelievable that it was given more then a 5 second penalty.
ColdFly (@)
14th April 2019, 10:16
5s and no penalty points would have been sufficient.
It seems some stewards and their couch supporters looked more at past races than what happened today on lap 1.
Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
14th April 2019, 8:52
He had oversteer that he couldn’t help and was unfortunate enough that one car he touched smacked into another. This also heavily effected his own race. Given how relaxed they were about penalties last race, this is no way bad enough for a drive through. It caused a lot of damage, but was not in the slightest bit clumsy. Was just very unfortunate. Every driver has oversteer at times and anyone that had it in the same way would have caused the same thing to happen. What could he have done differently?
Basil (@flyingbasil)
14th April 2019, 8:57
Changed his passport to a dutch or french one))) seriously, an american giving the hardest penalty possible to a russian. Liberty should hire a team of stewards for every GP instead of putting random people in each race.
ColdFly (@)
14th April 2019, 10:18
Interestingly, that’s exactly what they did a few years ago. The single race stewards are now from small pool, rather than random as it was in the past.
Drop Sochi
14th April 2019, 9:11
RIC understeered into HUL last race with no penalty, they penalise the consequence rather than the crime, has always been that way, probably always will unfortunately.
DAllein (@)
14th April 2019, 9:31
No, it was plain dumb and clumsy.
He had a kilometer of track empty around him, but he decided to overdo this, go as wide as possible and ruin the race for 2 other drivers.
I would have shown him a black flag. So drive-through and two penalty-points – is very soft punishment.
Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
14th April 2019, 9:57
You seriously think he decided have oversteer to go wide? He clearly didn’t choose to drive where he did. He had oversteer which he won’t have intended to have. That was the cause of going wide and it could have happened to anyone. That just happened to have a very bad outcome.
I shouldn’t be over reacting to this comment as just reading the words that imply he decided to go as wide as possible and ruin it for 2 drivers shows that you yourself are over reacting.
Kvyat would never decide to go wide and ruin a race for another team. No other driver would either as if it was deliberate, they would know their own race would get ruined too by penalties and damage. What he did din’t look at all risky. it was just unlucky that the car twitched when it did.
Manuel Falcao (@mfalcao)
14th April 2019, 10:15
In front of Kviat I think it was Kimi that had the same oversteer but he was lucky that no one was at his side.
Complete nonsense this penalty, it was a very unfortunate racing incident that ruined 2 drivers races, an then the stewards not happy enough ruined another driver’s race
ColdFly (@)
14th April 2019, 10:25
I’m glad that you’re not a steward, but lament that this site doesn’t use black flags.
BlackJackFan
14th April 2019, 16:07
Why would you want to make these “… plain dumb and clumsy…” comments, unless you have it in for KVY… Nothing like bigotry to produce intelligent contributions here… ;-)
Basil (@flyingbasil)
14th April 2019, 8:53
It seems russian drivers get the hardest penalities possible. We have seen it with Sirotkin last year, and now Kvyat again. 5 seconds extra in the pits would have been appropriate.10 if they wanted to teach a lesson but this? Even Romain wasnt judged this hard in his “crash days”.
anon
14th April 2019, 9:34
@flyingbasil, this would be the same Grosjean who was hit with a temporary ban and was under threat of having his licence temporarily revoked because of previous incidents?
It wasn’t uncommon for Grosjean to get fairly rough treatment from the stewards – there were instances of Grosjean getting penalised when it looked more like a case of the driver in front turning in and running over Grosjean’s front wing, for example.
I’m not sure I agree with the assertion that Sirotkin “got the hardest penalties possible”, because most of the penalties that he received during the season were for operational errors or technical faults by the team. He only got two penalties for driving infractions, which was one 5 second time penalty – for his defensive move on Hartley in the Singapore GP, where he was pushing him towards a barrier – and one grid penalty for being involved in a collision with Perez in Baku.
Now, the Baku penalty was debatable, but overall I wouldn’t say that he was treated any more harshly than any other driver in the midfield pack – there were quite a few other drivers in the midfield pack who got the same sort of penalties for similar incidents, which I would say is more of a case of the stewards tending to penalise the midfield pack more harshly in general compared to the front runners.
regs (@regs)
14th April 2019, 11:01
Indeed stewarding is going absolute disgrace. Been saying about it last year. It’s now has worse. They are doing whatever they want on personal preferences. All those stewards voted for the penalty have to go. And the process needs to change dramatically.
Drivers should have ability to disagree and appeal, that is in fact not allowed now. And stewards making those “mistakes” should also have own penalties. In other way nothing will change.
OOliver
14th April 2019, 9:19
Total rubbish Penalty. How about Norris not coming back to the race track in a safe manner.
This was a racing incident pure and simple.
Steven O
14th April 2019, 10:35
Fully agree, first lap racing accident and poor stewarding. What happened to the “let the guys race” policy that was put in place this year?
Gabriel (@rethla)
14th April 2019, 15:10
It doesnt include loosing your backend and then just stepping on the throttle like nothing has happened running over two cars and ending their race.
BD
14th April 2019, 11:17
Seriously!? How Norris came to the track in a non-safe manner while he was last after collision before joining back to the track. And how can it be total rubbish penalty while Kvyat oversteered because of carrying too much speed and even did not stop pushing gas pedal while he was oversteering and hit a car at the end of the left side of the track and then hitting the other afterwards? Just clumsy from Kvyat and it was fair to penalise him because he caused 2 collisions because of his own fault.
Ivan Vinitskyy (@ivan-vinitskyy)
14th April 2019, 9:28
Looked like Sainz triggered it by hitting Kvyat’s rear left triggering TR to snap left.
PKMNF1 (@alfir3dz1)
14th April 2019, 9:46
That penalty was ridiculous he was hit by Sainz and goes to the other Mclaren.
Martin
14th April 2019, 11:46
If that was a drive through then Vettel is owed 3 of them from 2018. Totally inconsistent and unfair on Kvyat
Richard C (@rich156)
14th April 2019, 12:53
This looked like classic kyvat until I saw the footage from Sainz’s car. That sandwich was a lot of Norris coming back on the track. Saintz realised too late & backed out with a lockup, then contact 1 (Sainz-Kvyat) , contact 2, (Sainz-Kvyat) Kvyat pitched, contact 3, (Kvyat-Norris) Norris pitched. It appears Derek Warwick might not have completely let go of his gripe with the old DannyK.
Eric
15th April 2019, 23:58
I am surprised by reading many comments saying oversteer happens, like this was an act of god… oversteer happens if you enter the curve too fast, following an inappropriate line and then you hit the throttle too much and too early. Entirely Kviat´s fault… he had plenty of laps to try to recover the lost positions in the exit but decided to drive aggressively, well over his capabilities in a track packed with vehicles around him
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
17th April 2019, 6:49
I disagree with the notion Kyvat did it entirely on his own (Stroll hit him from behind, hence the little wobble in Kyvat’s camera a little bit before he hits the McLarens). However, I’m not sure from the video whether Stroll simply missed his braking point (which would make this penalty an injustice) or Kyvat took Stroll’s braking space (in which case the penalty remains correct under the “predominantly to blame” rule).