George Russell has been given a reprimand and a warning but spared any further penalty after two incidents in FP2 at the Australian Grand Prix.
The favourite for the World Championship in many’s eyes looked to be at risk of a bad start to his season after he was the subject of two FIA stewards investigations.
George Russell avoids Australian GP penalty
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During FP2, Russell put himself in the bad books of the stewards for two separate incidents, the first of which saw him crash into Arvid Lindblad as the pair were exiting their respective garages.
With Lindblad, who started further back due to Racing Bull’s Constructors’ Championship position of last year already in the fast lane, Russell attempted to cut in ahead of him so much so that the newest F1 driver clipped the Mercedes’ front wing.
At the time, Russell suggested Lindblad had crashed into him but replays showed the No.63 car was not over the necessary line to be given right of way.
For that, Russell was given a reprimand with the stewards determining it was Lindblad who had priority.
A team of Nish Shetty, Mathieu Remmerie, Pedro Lamy and Matthew Selley said:
The Stewards heard from the driver of Car 41 (Arvid Lindblad) and the driver of Car 63 (George Russell), the team representatives and reviewed video, team radio and in-car video evidence and determined that Car 41 was in the queue of cars in the fast lane waiting to get out of the pit lane.
Car 63 left the garage and was waiting to join the fast lane. Car 63 inched forward, as if to join the fast lane and then stopped slightly ahead of Car 41, with a small portion of Car 63 jutting into the fast lane.
This resulted in Car 41 running over that portion of the front wing end plate of Car 63. There was no damage reported to us in relation to Car 41 as a result of the collision. Appendix L Chapter IV of the FIA International Sporting Code read with the Race Director Competition Notes Item 15 gives priority to the cars in the fast lane over those in the working lane. In other words, Car 41 had priority over Car 63. Car 63 would only have been free to blend into the fast lane “if there [was] a suitable gap in a queue of cars in the fast lane” and if it could be done safely and without unnecessarily impeding cars already in the fast lane.
It is clear, in this case, that there was no such gap and the collision resulted from Car 63 inching forward and thereby blocking a small portion of the fast lane. Both drivers agreed that the driver of Car 41 would not have been able to see the portion that was blocking the fast lane. In this case, the collision could have been avoided by Car 63 taking appropriate action and we therefore imposed a penalty of a reprimand to the driver of Car 63.
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The second incident involving Russell came when he performed a practice start outside of the designated area to do so which saw him breaching Article 12.2.1.i of the FIA International Sporting Code in combination with Item 14.1 of the Race Director Competition Notes (Document 8). For that, Russell was given a warning.
The stewards said:
The Stewards heard from the driver of Car 63 (George Russell) and the team representative and reviewed video evidence. The driver admitted that he performed a practice start outside the designated practice start area defined in Item 14.1 of the Race Director’s Competition Notes. However, he explained that, due to sun haze, he was unable to clearly see the grid boxes and believed that the correct location was where the rubber marks were visible on the asphalt.
Having viewed the Driver’s onboard and CCTV footage, we accept that the sighting of the grid box was difficult given the light conditions but the Driver was so far forward from the designated location that it was ahead of the protection of the pit wall and this incident occurred after the Race Director had warned all Teams of the need to comply with his instructions in this regard. The Stewards determined that the driver failed to follow the Race Director’s instructions and impose a penalty consistent with the penalty for similar breaches in the past.
The Stewards remind all Competitors that compliance with the Race Director’s instructions regarding the correct position from which to perform practice starts is imperative for the safe conduct of the Event.
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