Verstappen and Hamilton escape penalties for Mexico Formula 1 qualifying incidents

Before the final laps in Q1 of the race, Verstappen, Alonso and Russell backed up other cars as they left the pit lane in an attempt to create a gap and find fresh air.

All three drivers were summoned by FIA stewards for “unnecessary obstruction” at the pit exit, but decided to take no further action.

The drivers and their team managers successfully maintained that their actions were a result of the maximum delta time, which prevents drivers from exiting the track too slowly to find fresh air.

Instead, they felt obliged to do so at the pit lane exit, the only area of ​​the circuit not covered by the maximum delta time between the second and first safety car lines.

“The stewards consider that the entire set of incidents occurred as a direct result of the application of a minimum lap time between SC2 and SC1, which was (correctly, in our view) designed to avoid dangerous backstops,” the stewards wrote in their ruling. -Following the cars on the track during qualifying.

“We notice that there are conflicting demands on drivers as they must respect the minimum time, they try to create manageable gaps between the cars in front of them, but they also have to avoid unnecessary stops at the pit exit or drive unnecessarily slowly.”

Stewards agreed that driving slowly outside the pit lane is much less risky than backing up cars elsewhere on the race track, which results in greater differences in speed.

However, they pointed out that while pit accidents were the lesser of two evils, a solution must be found to avoid them recurring.

“All parties, including the stewards, have a firm view that it is better to have the cars back into pit lane or at the pit exit, rather than the potentially dangerous situation of large speed differences on track.

“It would be desirable to find a better solution to get out of the hole, but at this point, what that solution is is unknown.”

“They asked us not to stop in the pit lane,” Russell said of the situation, “but if you don’t gap in the pit lane, you have to go on the track. And to me, it’s very dangerous if ‘we’re going 10 km/h on Straight line while cars are traveling at 330 km/h on their propulsion cycles.”

Russell’s Mercedes teammate, Lewis Hamilton, was also cleared for failing to slow down for yellow flags in Q1, when Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso spun at Turn 3.

But the investigation soon showed that there was no fault on the part of the seven-time world champion, as he was slow enough compared to his previous fastest lap.

Under the same yellow flag area, Logan Sargent passed AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda, with the Williams driver being handed a 10-place drop penalty and two penalty points. The American was already set to start last in Mexico after having two laps removed in Q1 for exceeding track limits.

Williams was also fined €20,000, half of which was suspended, for leaving a jack in his pit box, which Tsunoda collided with while exiting his garage.