Aston Martin has petitioned the FIA to review the stewards’ decision to penalise Fernando Alonso for his collision with Carlos Sainz Jnr in the sprint race at the Shanghai Grand Prix last week.
Sainz’s Ferrari team and Aston Martin have been summoned to a virtual meeting of the stewards on Friday ahead of this weekend’s Miami Grand Prix. A document issued by the FIA indicated Aston Martin submitted the request on Tuesday after the race.Alonso was given a 10-second time penalty and three points on his licence for the collision. The stewards ruled he “caused a collision with car 55 [Sainz] at turn nine.”
The ‘right of review’ hearing on Friday will be held in up to two parts. The first part will determine whether Aston Martin have produced a “significant and relevant new element which was unavailable to the party seeking the review at the time of the decision concerned.” If they succeed in providing this the second part of the hearing will be held to reconsider the stewards’ decision in the light of the new information.
Alonso’s time penalty, which was issued in line with the 2024 driving standards guidelines, had no effect on his finishing position because he retired from the race. The stewards noted at the time that this area of the regulations regarding sprint races was “somewhat unclear.”
The goal of Aston Martin’s petition is therefore likely to be a reduction in the penalty points applied to Alonso’s licence. Along with his three-point endorsement at the Australian Grand Prix, for decelerating sharply in front of George Russell, Alonso has gone from no penalty points to six in the space of three rounds, putting him halfway towards an automatic race ban.
The meeting will be held at 8am Miami time on Friday.
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The two teams were involved in another penalty dispute during the Chinese Grand Prix weekend. Aston Martin protested the decision to allow Sainz to continue participating in qualifying after he came to a stop on-track for over a minute when he crashed in Q2. The stewards dismissed the protest.
Stewards’ original decision on Alonso-Sainz clash
The stewards heard from the driver of car 14 (Fernando Alonso), the driver of car 55 (Carlos Sainz), team representatives and reviewed positioning/marshalling system data, video and in-car video evidence and determined that car 14 caused a collision with car 55 at turn nine. The result of the collision was that car 55 was damaged and that car 14 had a puncture and retired before the end of the sprint session.
As per the guidelines on driving standards, which was agreed with the teams, an infringement of this nature required that a baseline penalty of 10 seconds was to be added to the time of a car that caused a collision.
Article 54.3 of the Sporting Regulations states if the 10 second penalty is imposed after the end of a sprint session, then 10 seconds will be added to the elapsed time of the driver concerned. We accordingly added 10 seconds to the elapsed time of car 14.
As an aside to the FIA, we note that the language in the regulations as to when a car has retired and the resultant consequences on penalties that may be imposed or served, especially when that car is otherwise classified, is somewhat unclear and we would recommend that the FIA considers making the necessary amendments to bring greater clarity to this issue.
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2024 Chinese Grand Prix
- Alonso and Sainz incidents prompt changes to Formula 1’s rules
- Aston Martin fail in bid to have Alonso’s Shanghai penalty reviewed
- Mercedes cleared over Hamilton pit stop infraction as ‘nearly all teams in breach’
- Aston Martin petitions FIA to review Alonso’s penalty for Sainz collision
- “You need to be more on it”: 12 unheard radio exchanges from the Chinese GP
cameron coulson
30th April 2024, 13:56
Excellent. After looking at this several times…the decision was ridiculous. Compared to other issues, ridiculous…
Señor Sjon
30th April 2024, 14:18
New information on the matter are the (non) penalties Magnussen and Stroll (2 pts each) got for taking out other drivers during the race, while a little wheelbanging docked Alonso 3 pts.
Nick T.
30th April 2024, 16:30
It’s a Kremlin level stretch to even call it a collision. Have to say it’s one of the most bizarre penalties I’ve ever seen. I was surprised it was even brought up for review.
Ben-Hur (@ben-hur)
2nd May 2024, 1:01
It is no longer a sport
Jim from US (@jimfromus)
30th April 2024, 16:31
I think the stewards handed ALO the penalty with the extra point because they felt it was a retaliatory collision instead of a clumsy racing move.
MichaelN
30th April 2024, 16:53
In the case of Stroll and Magnussen, they specifically note that the two were ‘predominantly to blame’. In the Alonso report, they do not, which leads one to assume they consider Alonso ‘wholly to blame’, thus an extra penalty point.
Nick T.
30th April 2024, 18:27
Them construing it as retaliation seems far-fetched. It didn’t smack of that nor does retaliating for being passed make sense.
Jere (@jerejj)
30th April 2024, 16:46
This long afterwards.
EffWunFan (@cairnsfella)
30th April 2024, 22:16
I feel I am in the minority, but I have always felt it was correct to assign the blame to Alonso.
However I agree the penalty was perhaps harsh (without the data that the stewards have available).
grat
30th April 2024, 23:56
When did the default penalty become three points?