Suspecting that Sergio Pérez had crossed the white line at turn 8, the measuring stick for the FIA at the Red Bul Ring this weekend, an investigation has ended with the #11 as 10th at the start.
Despite the fact that the qualifying session ended around 6:30 p.m., and that Sergio Pérez was summoned before the stewards at 7:00 p.m. for a possible infraction related to the track limits established by the FIA specifically for this weekend in Austria… had to wait 2 hours since the Mexican pilot went through the FIA to know the final verdict of a decision that has taken centuries.
In Q2, and even before Q3 had started, the FIA announced a research to the Red Bull driver for allegedly having crossed the white line that has been established at the Red Bull Ring as the point that all drivers must respect in each of their laps.
Whereas until now they had simply deleted immediately the times of the drivers who had gone beyond the limit, on this occasion there were doubts or there were unknown details that really deserved a deep investigation… and finally the FIA has shed light on this matter.
Without precedents
“Pérez went off the track in the turn 8 on his last flying lap of Q2, just before the end of the session. As this was not identified until the time before the start of Q3, his lap was not removed then and Pérez participated in Q3. This was a consequence of having to examine many situations in each session, the video was clear and there is no doubt of the infraction, which the team admitted, “says the statement.
In addition, the FIA points out that Red Bull assured that going off the track at that point does not lead to gaining a clear advantage, supporting it with data, although the sanction is seen from the point of “going off track without justifiable reason” and not for that fact, another part of the same norm.
Loading tweet…
1545433520025219072
In another order of factors, the FIA underlines that the fact that a driver passes the round in this peculiar way doesn’t happen regularlymuch less recently, so the stewards had to look at this as a novel situation.
While Red Bull later claimed the additional expenditure of resources involved in participating in Q3, in addition to the risk, the stewards, beyond accepting this resource, confirm that this does not make it different from other situations.
Since the usual penalty in these cases consists of eliminating the corresponding times, the FIA has chosen to do the same… but they still allow him to start ahead of a Pierre Gasly who stayed at the gates of the Top 10 respecting the margins of the track.