Five place grid penalty for Lewis Hamilton
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Hopes of taking the fight to Vettel this weekend already in ruins after a gearbox change for Hamilton.
Full statement from the FIA
‘Number Car Driver
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’44 Mercedes Lewis Hamilton
‘The above driver did finish the last race in Baku and this gearbox change was before the six consecutive Events expired. As this is not in compliance with Article 23.5a of the 2017 Formula One Sporting Regulations, I am referring this matter to the stewards for their consideration. The team informed the technical delegate about the gearbox change on Tuesday, 04th July 2017, at 11:29 hours.’
Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton is set to start on the back-foot for the Austrian GP, despite leading the times during both Friday practices. Hopes of cutting Vettel’s championship lead are seemingly now on the back-foot too.
In an unscheduled gearbox change, Mercedes have had to change the unit before it has completed its mandatory six races, with the matter referred to the stewards on Friday evening. The grid demotion of five places is the automatic sanction for a gearbox change out of sequence.
The world champions have ruled out any possibility that the damage to the unit was done when current world championship leader Sebastian Vettel hit Hamilton’s car during the Azerbaijan race two weeks ago.
Speaking before news of his impending grid demotion broke, Hamilton was confident and seemed at ease with the weekend to come, telling reporters: “The car felt good. It was a pretty good day. The track felt pretty good from the get go, the grip was amazing from the start. We had a good baseline to start with and we kept chipping away at it.
“We are going to work hard tonight to try and find some more performance. I got the car to the limit and we’ll now look at the weaknesses to improve. We generally do improve Friday to Saturday.”
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Confirmation of the unscheduled change came via Mercedes Twitter, at 7.30pm on Friday, despite informing the FIA on Tuesday of the impending change.
Hamilton currently trails Vettel by 14 points in the title race as we approach the halfway stage of the season and will need to qualify in pole in order to maintain any hopes of closing the gap with his main championship rival Vettel, this weekend.
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