Hamilton hit with five-place grid drop for Italian Grand Prix

Lewis Hamilton has been given a five-place grid drop for the Italian Grand Prix for a pre-race incident at the Dutch Grand Prix.

The Ferrari driver was found to have failed to slow sufficiently for yellow flags in the final corner during a reconnaissance lap. As the stewards noted, double waved yellow flags were used at that point on the track prior to the race for safety reasons.

“Due to the nature of the track, the race director had informed all participants that the last corner before the pit lane would have double yellow flags waved,” they explained. “This was to ensure the safety of those on the grid and in the pit lane.”

Although Hamilton did reduce his speed, the stewards ruled he did not slow down sufficiently.

“The regulations require that any driver passing through a double waved yellow flag marshalling sector ‘reduce speed significantly…’,” they noted. “We looked through the available telemetry within the FIA system. We also requested the team to provide us with their telemetry data. All of this took some time and this decision was delayed as a result.

“In addition, Article 44.1 requires all drivers covering more than one reconnaissance lap to drive down the pit entry road at ‘greatly reduced speed’.

“The data showed that the driver had entered the double yellow sector approximately 20kph less than his speed at the same point in practice sessions, had reduced throttle application in the order of 10% to 20% and had lifted and braked 70 metres earlier when entering the pit lane.

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“We did not consider that a 20kph reduction in speed at a double waved yellow sector constituted reducing speed ‘significantly’. We also did not consider the speed at which the driver entered the pit entry road as being at a ‘greatly’ reduced speed.”

The stewards considered issuing a harsher penalty. “The penalty guidelines for such an infringement would ordinarily attract a penalty of 10 grid positions at the next race,” they noted. “However, given that the driver had made an attempt to reduce his speed and to brake earlier, we took that into account as mitigating circumstances and imposed a five-grid-place penalty.”

Hamilton also received two penalty points on his licence, which are his first for the current 12-month period. He had gone 51 consecutive race weekends without incurring any penalty points.

The stewards also cleared four other drivers for failing to adhere to the maximum time limit between the Safety Car lines during their reconnaissance laps. Max Verstappen, Lando Norris, Carlos Sainz Jnr and Nico Hulkenberg were all found to have driven too slowly but in each case the stewards ruled they did not do so unnecessarily, having slowed down to let others pass.

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