Sauber driver Valtteri Bottas has been handed a three-place grid penalty for Saturday's Sprint race in Miami following a near-miss impeding incident that took place during qualifying.
The close call happened during the first round of qualifying when Bottas turned across the front of the McLaren of Oscar Piastri, who was passing him down the inside of turn 1.
Piastri had been on a flying lap when he approached Bottas driving slowly on the racing line. Both cars needed to take avoiding action in order not to make contact into the first corner.
"If that's not a penalty, then I don't know what is," Piastri immediately complained over the McLaren team radio. His complaint was soon echoed by team CEO Zak Brown.
"That was a pretty close call, pretty dangerous. I heard Valtteri on the radio, he clearly hadn't seen [him," Brown told reporters in the paddock.
"It's really the team's responsibility to let the drivers know what's going on around them, so I'd be surprised if that wasn't some form of penalty," Brown added. "No damage, I don't think they made contact, so everything is okay."
Race stewards duly marked the incident for a full investigation after the end of qualifying. Both drivers and their respective team representatives were summoned to the stewards' office to explain what had happened.
Sauber acknowledged that the team pit wall had failed to warn warned Bottas that Piastri was approaching and were deemed to be at fault for what could have been a serious and dangerous situation.
Bottas has a new race engineer this weekend in place of Alex Chan which potentially contributed to a lack of clear and timely communication. A startled Bottas was heard to say: "F***, that's too late man, I had no idea."
But even so, it's still the driver who pays the price with Bottas handed a three place penalty. As the Finn had finished the session in P18, this drops him to the back ohe grid behind the two Williams of Logan Sargeant and Alex Albon.
“The primary responsibility rests with the driver to ensure that he does not place himself in a position whereby he unnecessarily impedes another driver," the statement from the stewards explained.
"[Bottas] was driving slowly on the racing line and caused the situation that ensued”, continued, while acknowledging that the team's failure to warn Bottas in time was 'an error [that] contributed significantly to the incident."
Bottas had already indicated his unhappiness with the the team's decision to change his race engineer without warning just days before Miami.
"It was quite a sudden change,” Bottas said in Thursday's FIA press conference. “It’s a Sprint weekend so working with a fresh guy will be not easy. But obviously trying to make the most out of it. He’s getting lots of support.
“I think it’s part of the reconstruction for the team,” he suggested. “I don’t know all the reasons behind every decision that is being made, but it just tells that change is happening, people are leaving, people are coming in."
In a separate matter before the stewards, Mercedes will not be penalised despite some team personnel failing to wear required protective eyewear while attending to Lewis Hamilton’s car in the pits.
The stewards found other teams had been guilty of the same breach, and urged the FIA to “consider whether changes need to be made to either the current practices during qualifying/sprint qualifying or the regulations themselves.”
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