The stewards' logic for penalising Verstappen

The Saudi Arabian Grand Prix stewards have explained why they ruled against Max Verstappen with the penalty that arguably cost him Formula 1 victory in Jeddah.

Verstappen was given a five-second penalty for leaving the track and gaining a lasting advantage following an incident with Oscar Piastri at the first corner of the race.

Piastri had a better start and pulled ahead of Verstappen on the inside into Turn 1.

But Verstappen braked later on the outside, which meant he got his front axle slightly ahead further round the corner - then took to the run-off as Piastri’s momentum meant the McLaren ran wide and left no room for Verstappen.

The reason the stewards sided with Piastri is how they viewed the position of the cars by the apex of the corner, slightly earlier in the sequence than when Verstappen opted to go onto the run-off.

F1’s racing guidelines, which have been tweaked for this year but not in a way that influenced this incident, stipulate that a car overtaking on the inside must have its front axle at least alongside the mirror of the other car no later than the apex of the corner.

It must also be driven in a safe and controlled manner from entry to exit, and be able to make the corner within the track limits.

The stewards felt that Piastri complied with all these three things, as they said “Car 81 had its front axle at least alongside the mirror of Car 1 prior to and at the apex of corner 1 when trying to overtake Car 1 on the inside” and “in fact, Car 81 was alongside Car 1 at the apex”.

“Based on the Driver’s Standards Guidelines, it was therefore Car 81’s corner and he was entitled to be given room,” the stewards said.

Another requirement is that the move must be made without deliberately forcing the other car off the track at the exit, which includes leaving a fair and acceptable width for the other car from the apex to the exit.

This is not specifically covered in the stewards' document. However, it is understood telemetry of the incident indicated Verstappen was unlikely to remain on the track - and therefore he was not deemed to have been 'forced off' by Piastri.

Had Verstappen managed to stay on track himself and been crowded out by Piastri, or even had there been contact, the dynamics of the incident would have been different and it could have been judged differently.

Verstappen was given a five-second penalty instead of the usual 10-second baseline because the stewards opted to apply leniency.

“Given that this was lap one and a Turn 1 incident, we considered that to be a mitigating circumstance and imposed a five-second time penalty instead,” the stewards said.