Lance Stroll will start last instead of starting… last
The Canadian driver was deemed responsible for the collision with Nicholas Latifi during the first qualifying session. He has been handed a three-place grid penalty, a sanction that does not affect his starting position for tomorrow's race.
At the very end of Q1, while Lance Stroll was faster than his compatriot Nicholas Latifi, the Williams driver let him pass by moving off the racing line before re-overtaking him a few meters later, after the Aston Martin driver eased off the throttle.
Except that Lance Stroll squeezed Latifi onto the edge of the track, which sent him into the wall, causing a session interruption. The stewards have taken up the investigation and have summoned both drivers at 6 pm, local time.
DRAPEAU ROUGE 🟥
Incident et Crash Stroll / Latifi ! Pilotes OK.#AusGP #AustralianGP 🇦🇺
▶️ https://t.co/7plkVVV12v pic.twitter.com/eBrt02guHB
— CANAL+ F1® (@CanalplusF1) April 9, 2022
It emerged that Lance Stroll was the main responsible for this incident. He received a penalty of three grid positions. This penalty is not significant for him since he did not set a time during that session. However, he incurs two penalty points on his super license, bringing his total to seven points (out of a total of 12).
The decision of the commissioners
« LAT veered left and slowed down at the exit of turn 4 to let cars pass, with STR’s car being the last one. At the exit of turn 5, STR did not seem to accelerate and was in the middle of the track. LAT made the decision to accelerate and overtake STR on the right, while STR was moving towards the right side of the track where the circuit slightly turns to the right leading to turn 6.
A contact occurred between the right front wheel of STR and the left rear wheel of LAT, resulting in damage that took both cars out of the session. The stewards believe that STR is primarily responsible for the collision due to their lack of awareness during the overtaking maneuver on LAT.
