📰 FIA reveals "mitigating" reason Liam Lawson got harsher penalty than Max Verstappen

By Christopher Reive

The difference between a 5s and a 10s penalty was 27 laps in yesterday’s Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.

Kiwi driver Liam Lawson was stuck with the larger of those two numbers following his overtake of Alpine’s Jack Doohan, as he was deemed to have gained an advantage by going off the track.

Lawson got past his Australian counterpart heading into turn one on lap 28 of 50 in the race, moving from 15th to 14th. Lawson had completed the overtake before coming to the turn, but went into the turn with too much speed and had to go off the track.

Documents from ruling body the FIA explaining the ruling said that moment was deemed to have affected the overtake and the stewards handed him his third time penalty in two races.

“The Stewards reviewed positioning/marshalling system data, video, timing, telemetry, team radio and in-car video evidence and determined that Car 30 (Lawson) attempted to overtake Car 7 (Doohan) and in doing so left the track,” the ruling said.

“While he completed the overtake before turn one, the speed that he carried into the turn meant that he could not navigate turn one without leaving the track. He therefore could not successfully overtake Car 7 without leaving the track and thereby gained a lasting advantage which he did not give back.

“The standard penalty of 10 seconds was therefore applied.”

The penalty was applied to Lawson’s time at the end of the race, seeing him cross the line in 11th but officially finishing 12th – where he started the race.

The ruling has drawn some criticism, particularly after Red Bull ace Max Verstappen was given a lesser penalty for a similar incident early in the race.

Verstappen started from pole position, but a good start from McLaren’s Oscar Piastri saw the Dutch driver under threat of losing his position at the front of the pack.

As he and Piastri went side by side in their battle for the lead, Verstappen went off the track at turn two and, in doing so, was able to stay at the front until he made his pit stop on lap 22, where he served his penalty.

The stewards determined Piastri had put himself into a favourable position and should have been given room to take the corner, but lessened the penalty due to it occurring early in the race.

“Car 1 [Verstappen] then left the track and gained a lasting advantage that was not given back. He stayed in front of Car 81 [Piastri] and sought to build on the advantage,” the ruling said.

“Ordinarily, the baseline penalty for leaving the track and gaining a lasting advantage is 10 seconds. However, given that this was lap one and [a] turn-one incident, we considered that to be a mitigating circumstance and imposed a five-second time penalty instead.”

Piastri ultimately won the race, while Verstappen finished second, less than 3s back.

For Lawson, 11th would have been his best finish of the season so far – though 12th equals the mark he set in China while driving for Red Bull, after which he was demoted to the Racing Bulls team and replaced by Yuki Tsunoda, who was forced to retire from the race in Saudi Arabia after a first-lap crash.

A season-best would have reflected his drive in the race, which was his best performance of the campaign so far and saw him successfully overtake a few times, though he again lost places off the starting line – with teammate Isack Hadjar and Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso getting ahead of him.

Hadjar ultimately finished 10th to score a point, while Alonso was bumped ahead of Lawson when the time penalty was applied.

“Today was tough and while we had very good pace throughout the race, we spent the majority of it with traffic no matter what we did,” Lawson said.

“The penalty obviously didn’t help and it’s a shame as this weekend has been the most comfortable I’ve felt in the car. We’re doing all the right things and it all needs to come together now to get some points.

“Isack made the most of his clean first stint and it’s great for the team to grab another point this weekend. It’s very close in the midfield at the moment and we’ll try and work on improving this for Miami. It’s a track I haven’t driven but am excited for. We’ll keep pushing.”

This article was first published on nzherald.co.nz and is republished here with permission