F1 | Gasly: ​​fourth place vanishes, 6 penalty positions on the grid

A nice fourth place faded in the space of a few minutes. Pierre Gasly will have to serve six penalty positions on the penalty grid due to the two impediments that saw him involved during qualifying, when he first hindered Carlos Sainz in the approach to the last corner and then Max Verstappen in turn four.

The French driver thus sees an extremely positive Saturday come to naught, with a second row that would have allowed him to bring home important points in the race, taking advantage of the good performances shown by the team over the course of the weekend.

As for the case with Verstappen in turn three, the note reads that “the team did not adequately warn the driver of car number 10 [Gasly] of the approach of car number 1 [Verstappen], having told him the cars behind him were on a slow lap”. In this scenario, therefore, the fault falls on the track engineer, who did not provide the correct indications to his driver, but the marshals had already explained in the past that this cannot be an excuse to avoid a penalty.

The episode that instead led to the penalty for impeding Carlos Sainz in the final stages of the lap, where in reality Gasly was aware of the Spaniard’s position, was different. In fact, as stated in the press release, “The driver of car number 10 [Gasly] he declared that he realized that the Ferrari was behind him, but felt he could do nothing to avoid hindering him due to the difference in speed and the proximity of 55 to 16″. Although there is an element that plays to make the Frenchman, “the Stewards believe that he [Gasly] could have moved further to the right at the exit of turn 13”, which is the reason for the penalty.

“It’s a real shame that tomorrow we won’t start from the second row after the penalty for hindering other riders. I think I was very unlucky with the traffic, the cars so close together and the high speed final corners. We have to accept it, go ahead and keep our heads down for tomorrow, where I know we can still have a good race,” commented the transalpine from Alpine after learning of the sanction.