Aston Martin has petitioned the FIA to review the stewards’ decision to penalise Fernando Alonso for his collision with Carlos Sainz Jnr in the sprint race at the Shanghai Grand Prix last week.
Sainz’s Ferrari team and Aston Martin have been summoned to a virtual meeting of the stewards on Friday ahead of this weekend’s Miami Grand Prix. A document issued by the FIA indicated Aston Martin submitted the request on Tuesday after the race.
Alonso was given a 10-second time penalty and three points on his licence for the collision. The stewards ruled he “caused a collision with car 55 [Sainz] at turn nine.”
The ‘right of review’ hearing on Friday will be held in up to two parts. The first part will determine whether Aston Martin have produced a “significant and relevant new element which was unavailable to the party seeking the review at the time of the decision concerned.” If they succeed in providing this the second part of the hearing will be held to reconsider the stewards’ decision in the light of the new information.
Alonso’s time penalty, which was issued in line with the 2024 driving standards guidelines, had no effect on his finishing position because he retired from the race. The stewards noted at the time that this area of the regulations regarding sprint races was “somewhat unclear.”
The goal of Aston Martin’s petition is therefore likely to be a reduction in the penalty points applied to Alonso’s licence. Along with his three-point endorsement at the Australian Grand Prix, for decelerating sharply in front of George Russell, Alonso has gone from no penalty points to six in the space of three rounds, putting him halfway towards an automatic race ban.
The meeting will be held at 8am Miami time on Friday.
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The two teams were involved in another penalty dispute during the Chinese Grand Prix weekend. Aston Martin protested the decision to allow Sainz to continue participating in qualifying after he came to a stop on-track for over a minute when he crashed in Q2. The stewards dismissed the protest.
Stewards’ original decision on Alonso-Sainz clash
The stewards heard from the driver of car 14 (Fernando Alonso), the driver of car 55 (Carlos Sainz), team representatives and reviewed positioning/marshalling system data, video and in-car video evidence and determined that car 14 caused a collision with car 55 at turn nine. The result of the collision was that car 55 was damaged and…
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