Mercedes stance amid claim they blocked Ferrari penalty reprieve at Las Vegas GP
Mercedes have denied the claim that they might have blocked Formula 1 stewards from going easy on Carlos Sainz after the Spaniard was slapped with a harsh penalty for the Las Vegas Grand Prix.
His Ferrari sustained heavy damage during practice when a loose drain cover was sucked out of the ground by his car and smashed into it. Several parts were damaged beyond repair, including on the engine which required new components.
Sainz was forced to fit a new energy store to his car, meaning he went over his annual allowance. That triggered an automatic grid penalty, but Ferrari appealed for an exception to be made as the last one was destroyed through no fault of their own.
The stewards had sympathy for Sainz and spent a lot of time trying to find a loophole in the rules. But, eventually, they confirmed that there was nothing that they could do other than give him a 10-place grid drop as the regulations demand.
Sky Sports pundits Jenson Button and Karun Chandhok agreed that it would have been fair to waive that penalty on this occasion. And most others felt the same, including McLaren chief executive Zak Brown who said his team would have been happy to see Ferrari let off on this occasion.
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Asked if McLaren would have supported it, he replied: "Yeah, for sure. You've got to say that's force majeure, nothing of their own doing, a very unfortunate, unique incident. I was a bit surprised to see that. A little bit unfair."
Brown went on to suggest that one of the teams might have stood in the way of that happening. And Sky commentator David Croft hinted that he had information that was true also, leading to speculation that Mercedes, who are in a fight with Ferrari for second in the constructors' championship, might have put their foot down.
But Croft's colleague Ted Kravitz said he had been flatly told by Mercedes that this is not true. "I've reached out to Mercedes [to ask] is it the case that you would have or could have objected to a Sainz derogation for that penalty?" he told viewers.
"They said, 'No, absolutely not, purely speculative. The precedent is that even when it's not the driver or team's fault, you carry the penalty and the rules don't allow for discretion to be applied', as the steward explained. Mercedes' point was that they would not have been in a position to object to any derogation.
"Their only position would have been if the rules had been incorrectly applied and some derogation or allowance would have been made for Sainz. Then, I think Mercedes would have objected to that and probably some other teams as well, because you can't have the rules being incorrectly applied, can you?"
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