AlphaTauri driver Yuki Tsunoda has been given a three place grid penalty for tomorrow's Dutch Grand Prix after being deemed to have blocked Lewis Hamilton during today's qualifying session at Zandvoort.
The FIA stewards talked to both drivers after the end of the session about an incident in which Hamilton appeared to have been held up by Tsunoda in the closing stages of Q2.
Hamilton ended up missing the cut leaving him in 13th place in the timings. Tsunoda also failed to progress to the final top ten pole shoot-out round and was shown in P14.
But after reviewing the available telemetry and other evidence, Tsunoda has been demoted to 17th place on the grid for impeding Hamilton. Haas’ Nico Hulkenberg, Alfa Romeo’s Zhou Guanyu and Alpine’s Esteban Ocon all get one place boosts.
“Tsunoda was on the dry racing line at the exit of turn 13 preparing for his fast lap and had not fully come up to speed and therefore impeded Hamilton,” the stewards reported.
“Tsunoda explained that he had been passed by another car and decided to remain slow in order to regain his gap. In the opinion of the stewards, Tsunoda clearly had the ability to stay off the line and therefore this impeding was unnecessary."
Mercedes boss Toto Wolff had earlier made his unhappiness with the Japanese driver's conduct clear, declaring it to be “pretty ugly”.
“Tsunoda’s a nice guy but he impeded Lewis on his quick lap," he stated emphatically. "He didn’t move from the dry line. He dived on the inside. It didn’t look like it cost much, but going from a dry line to a wet line and back onto dry line cost [Lewis].
"I think a tenth would have put him into Q3," Wolff suggested. "Lewis had really good pace all weekend and it’s really painful to see that - because of traffic - you’re not making use of going into Q3, which he would have deserved."
Hamilton was also on the receiving end of another alleged impeding incident, this time with Aston Martin's Lance Stroll, but in this case the stewards decided not to take any further action.
"Stroll was on a prep lap and Hamilton was on a fast lap both approaching turn 13," the statement explained. "The stewards observed that Stroll had stayed out of the way of several cars from turn 10 through turn 12.
"He then started accelerating for the next lap early enough that he should have not impeded Hamilton. His speed at the apex of turn 13 was similar to fast cars at that point.
"At the exit of turn 13 he had not gained enough momentum and affected Hamilton’s lap [but] in the opinion of the stewards, while Hamilton was impeded, Stroll’s behaviour did not rise to the level of “unnecessarily impeding” as specified in the Regulations."
Hamilton also felt he'd had a near miss with Stroll's team mate Fernando Alonso during the session, but the stewards had already ruled out investigating the incident.
However a close call between Oscar Piastri and Carlos Sainz at turn 2 as the Ferrari emerged from pit lane and swept in front of the McLaren saw the Spaniard given a reprimand and his team fined 5000 euros for failing to alert him in time.
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