Max Verstappen who managed to find himself on pole for Mexican Grand Prix. But he will no longer be able to start at front.
After the qualifying, stewards investigated and ruled against Verstappen for not abiding FIA rules to slow down during yellow flags on the tracks.
He passed the crash scene of Valterri Bottas and did’t slowed down as per the regulations.
Verstappen was handed a three point grid penalty for not conceding to FIA regulations. The penalty will put Charles Leclerc at pole position with his team mate, Sebastian Vettel, on the front row.
Hamilton will start third with Verstappen on fourth position at Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez.
Initial investigation by FIA ruled out any transgression by Verstappen. But his comments during the press conference pushed the agency to re-evaluate their decision
During a question in press conference whether he abode by the regulation to slow down, he commented: “Didn’t look like it, did it? We all know what the yellow flag means. We know what we are doing, otherwise we wouldn’t be driving an F1 car.”
The stewards later commented that Verstappen “admitted that he was aware that car 77 (Valtteri Bottas) crashed and did see the car on the left hand side of the track, but was not aware of the waved yellow flag.”
“He also admitted not reducing his speed on the yellow sector,” the stewards added.
Verstappen only had passed a single yellow flag just after he crossed the crashed Bottas around the corner.
“The stewards noted from the onboard images of car 33, that the waved yellow flag was clearly visible and was shown with enough notice. The previous driver (car five [Sebastian Vettel]) reduced the speed [significantly] as per the regulations.”
Red Bull leading driver was handed two points penalty on his license. This accumulates to total four this year. The penalty is similar to the one he was handed over last year at Russian Grand Prix for the same infringement.
Red Bull, Verstappen team, issued a statement in which it termed the penalty as “very disappointing.”
Hamilton commented on the event and consider it highly unsafe.
“It’s important that the FIA are really strict about the double yellow flags,” he said. “He didn’t even need to go flat-out, he had already got pole. For all he knew, Valtteri could have been in the middle of the circuit. It’s not great. The flags normally mean, ‘Slow the f— down.”
