The Saudi Arabian Grand Prix ended with a lot of dramas. Apart from Red Bull’s one-two victory, Fernando Alonso’s 100th podium was the most certain thing. But due to the penalty, he was demoted to the fourth position. As a result, George Russell, who finished fourth, was moved a position ahead to the podiums. But later on, after proper investigation, it was found that no one other than Aston Martin deserves the third position. Russell had to return the silver trophy back to Alonso.
Given this, a question arises, who created this chaos in the first place? Why the stewards had to demote the Spaniard, which later was proved wrong? Some of the reports suggest that it was Mercedes who complained to the officials about Fernando. And that’s how the Silver Arrows paved the way to their first podium, which remained illusionary.
Actually, when Fernando was serving the 5 seconds penalty in the pit stop, the Aston Martin team was not supposed to touch the car. Because of this, FIA downgraded the Spaniard a position behind. However, in history, several times, the teams have been seen working on the car during the penalty pitstop, but none of them were penalized for it. Even after the celebration, Alonso had to drop off his trophy; it was unacceptable. Aston Martin realized it was unfair, given the fact that no other team ever faced such a penalty in similar conditions. So they argued, and FIA finally had to accept their mistake.
Mercedes Tried To Make Some Gain Out Of Fernando Alonso’s Pit Stop Penalty
Looks like ‘Mercedes’ somehow seems responsible for the confusion. When Russell was left with two laps, his team on the radio informed him that Fernando was about to get another pitstop due to the penalty. George Russell was waiting for his rival’s penalty when he realized that he was pushing the W14 like a madman. But the point to be noted here was that there was no official investigation being done. So how and why on earth were Mercedes expecting another penalty for Fernando Alonso?
A piece of news emerged, and Mercedes got the blame for snitching about the Aston Martin’s driver to F1 Stewards. This initiated long-run confusion in the investigation. And the update has been pointed out by none other than the Sky Sports F1 pitlane reporter, Ted Kravitz. After the ‘third podium, Alonso-Russell’ drama, the Sky Sports reporter explained the matter. Kravitz explained that a team is not allowed to do any work on the car while their driver serves the pitstop penalty. But the remote operations present there saw that the person standing back of the car was touching the car even before the five-second penalty was served.
“They [the stewards] decided that the Aston Martin has to real hard place to go with. The guy did not touch the car, or let’s say he did, also then IT WAS OKAY,” said Ted Kravitz. However, the matter did not end there because later on, another team came up to gain something out of the situation “the rumor is Mercedes complained to the F1 officials about the same.” They told them that they needed to take a further look at Fernando’s matter, reminding them of the Sporting Advisro Committee (SAC) that does not allow any team to touch the car with the rear jack.