Haas fined for first free practice at Monza

The first penalty of the weekend has already been imposed. The FIA has decided to penalize Haas’ team after its driver, Kevin Magnussen, blocked Carlos Sainz during the first free practice session. The Danish driver was indeed driving too slowly on the racing line at the exit of the second Lesmo corner, at the moment when the Spaniard was approaching at full speed, attempting a fast lap that he unfortunately had to give up.

Magnussen bothered Sainz in turns 6 and 7

After the session, the governing body of Formula 1 discussed with the drivers and team representatives, ruling in favor of Ferrari while penalizing Haas with a fine of $7,500, even though the FIA considered the situation not potentially dangerous. Nonetheless, it was the team, and not the driver, who was found guilty of this mistake, as the American team did not alert its driver of Carlos Sainz’s arrival behind him. The stewards, based on the various data available to them, deemed that Haas had enough time to communicate this information to their driver.

« The radio of car 20 revealed that no warning about the approach of car 55 was given until the moment car 55 was right behind », explained the FIA, which felt obligated to penalize the team, despite Sainz’s explanation that it was not a dangerous incident. Magnussen, on the other hand, could not do anything in this situation.

« The driver of car 20 explained that he had checked his mirrors and that due to the layout of the circuit at that point, car 55 was not visible. In addition, between turns 6 and 7, another car was driving slowly between cars 20 and 55, outside the racing line, specified the stewards.

The team found at fault

The FIA also wanted to justify this penalty: « It was obvious from the GPS data, available to the team, that car 55 was rapidly approaching by overtaking cars behind car 20, and therefore, an appropriate warning should have been given to the driver of car 20. Normally, in accordance with our penalty guidelines, a formal warning would have been issued to the driver of car 20. »

« However, in this case, we consider that due to the configuration of the circuit at this point, which did not facilitate the visibility of the approach of car 55, such a warning was not deserved. In this case, although the team made a mistake, the situation was not potentially dangerous, and the penalty imposed on the team is therefore reduced by half compared to the two previous ones this year. » Magnussen thus avoided a new sanction, he who is already on the hot seat with 10 penalty points out of the 12 units available before a potential suspension.