F1 News, Reports and Race Results

30-place grid penalty for Hamilton at Spa

Mercedes has announced Lewis Hamilton will drop at least 30 places on the grid at the Belgian Grand Prix due to an engine penalty.

Hamilton suffered a number of reliability issues in the first half of the season, leaving him requiring extra power unit components following the summer break. Mercedes announced on Thursday that Hamilton would be taking a penalty at Spa-Francorchamps and has now confirmed he will have at least a 30-place grid penalty.

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The penalty is as a result of taking a sixth turbocharger and sixth MGU-H ahead of FP1. The first time a driver uses the sixth of any component they receive an automatic 10-place grid penalty, while the sixth of any other component after that original penalty carries a drop of five places.

For FP2, Hamilton took a full new power unit, receiving fresh versions of all six components. Again, only the turbocharger and MGU-H carried penalties, resulting in a further drop of 15 places. Hamilton is now also on the limit of the internal combustion engine (ICE) and MGU-K, having taken a fifth of each component.

As it stands, Hamilton holds a 19-point advantage over team-mate Nico Rosberg in the drivers' championship, but the penalty hands Rosberg a golden opportunity to erase some of that deficit on Sunday.

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.