Gasly slapped with six-place grid drop for Spanish GP

Alpine’s Pierre Gasly has been handed a six-place grid penalty for the Spanish Grand Prix after they impeded both Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz and Red Bull’s Max Verstappen in qualifying.

The Alpine driver was summoned to the steward’s office twice, after qualifying, as Gasly had two separate impeding incidents against his name. Following the discussions with the French driver, his team representatives, plus Sainz, Verstappen and their representatives, it was deemed the Alpine driver was at fault for both occasions.

Following the outcome of the impeding instances, Gasly has been handed two three-place grid drops which will bring his total up to six grid positions ahead of the Spanish GP.

The first instance came in Q1 where the Alpine driver hugged the inside line of turn 13 to allow the Ferrari of Charles Leclerc to pass him.

In the Stewards report, Gasly admitted that he was aware of another Ferrari behind Leclerc but stated ‘he could do nothing to avoid impeding’ due to the ‘high-speed delta and closeness of Car 55 (Sainz) to Car 16 (Leclerc).’

Following the incident, Sainz reported he had to lift in the fast-swooping double-right-hander to avoid a collision with the slow-moving Alpine.

Later on, Alpine’s driver found himself in hot bother once again as he had mistaken the reigning world champion, Verstappen, to be on a slow lap rather than a flying one.

This came after the team had told Gasly had told the #10 Alpine that all of the cars behind him were on a slow lap.

After the punishments are to be served, in the Spanish Grand Prix, it will drop Gasly from fourth to 10th. However, the grid drop will still keep both Alpine cars within the top 10 as Esteban Ocon will inherit sixth place.

Despite being impeded both drivers still managed to make it through to Q3 and will share the front-row together with Verstappen on pole ahead of Sainz.

That’s all for the article: Gasly slapped with six-place grid drop for Spanish GP!

Read more Formula 1 here:

• Spanish GP: Verstappen on pole as Gasly and Russell go to stewards
• Spanish GP: Verstappen fastest in FP2 one-tenth ahead of Alonso
• Spanish GP: Verstappen flies to the top seven-tenths ahead of Perez
• Monaco GP: Leclerc slapped with 3-place grid drop after Norris impede
• Monaco GP: Verstappen narrowly takes pole by 0.084s over Alonso
• Mercedes lift covers off new upgrades ahead of Monaco GP

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Kamron Kent

Hi, I’m Kamron. I created ApexMotorsports.co.uk in the dying embers of the 2021 Formula 1 world championship. It allowed me freedom to write whatever I wanted to write about which was all things motorsports, my passion.

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