The term ‘Track Limit’ has inarguably been one of the most hated terms of the weekend so far at the Qatar Grand Prix. Earlier on Friday, the McLaren F1 duo Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri suffered a massive heartbreak despite pulling off one of the greatest qualifying outings of all time with a firm P2 and P3. However, minutes later, Norris was forced to give up his best lap time, subsequently falling down the order into P10.
Meanwhile, his teammate, Piastri, who was busy in the middle of his post-qualifying interview, was abruptly intervened by the interviewer with an embarrassing revelation. Hence, the Australian looked quite disappointed as he walked out of the parc ferme while Lewis Hamilton took over his spot. A similar story unfolded today during the Sprint shootout where Fernando Alonso was denied a potential top-5 start for the sprint.
Soon, the Spaniard’s former Alpine teammate Esteban Ocon, joined him with a track limit violation on the final flying lap as the duo found themselves on the 5th row. After all the shenanigans that had unfolded over the weekend, it is now Charles Leclerc facing the worst punishment of all.
šØ | BREAKING: Charles Leclerc receives a 5-second time penalty for exceeding track limits multiple times.
Albon promoted to P7, Alonso into P8 for the last point.
ā formularacers (@formularacers_) October 7, 2023
There is absolutely no denying that the Monegasque worked his bones out to bring about a decent points haul for Ferrari out of the sprint. However, to his poor luck, the FIA eventually revealed that Leclerc had exceeded the track limits far too many times.
Therefore, the lead Ferrari driver has been handed a five-second time penalty, and hence, despite the hard-fought battles against Carlos Sainz and Lewis Hamilton, Leclerc will end up in P9 and out of the point-scoring bandwidth.
Charles Leclerc makes costly error at Qatar F1 sprint
It is a known fact that every driver is given four strikes each before the stewards take the matter into their own hands and begin throwing out penalties. And bizarrely enough, Leclerc had zero track limit violations heading into the final lap. Meaning, all of his violations happened on the very last lap of the sprint, which forced the FIA to make the late decision to punish him with a costly time penalty.
Me: Wow, what an amazing sprint race, I’m happy
*finds out Charles Leclerc had 4 track limit violations on the last lap alone*
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ā Matt Gallagher (@MattP1Gallagher) October 7, 2023
By the looks of it, Leclerc isn’t walking alone on the path to penalty. Along with the Monegasque, there’s the persistently struggling Lance Stroll with potentially 5 track limit violations. The numbers are from a mere sprint race. Hence, one can only imagine the catastrophe that awaits the entire grid on Sunday. Will there be raining time penalties at the Qatar Grand Prix?
