Physical Address
304 North Cardinal St.
Dorchester Center, MA 02124
Rousseau’s case was complicated because he fell out of command through a series of events.
Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll was penalized for pit-lane speed – just 0.1 km/h – before the safety-car period due to his accident.
Russell moved under the safety car to change the tires but in the confusion, he was unable to carry out the penalty.
Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc crashed as the safety car came in, bringing the race to a red flag halt.
At the stoppage of the race, it was revealed that Russell had received a five-second failure to serve penalty. He pleaded with the officials not to take that penalty when the match resumed and to discuss it later because penalty number one indicated something was wrong.
They rejected the argument, and when the race restarted, Russell again went in to serve a driving penalty, which dropped him from third place.
Under F1 rules, Mercedes could only ask for a five-second time penalty to be assessed, regardless of whether it was given in error and not actually served.
The driving penalty was given correctly – he failed to serve the penalty accordingly. Mercedes have researched the legal complexities surrounding this and concluded that there is no solution for them.
The first right-of-way request for review at last weekend’s Barcelona-Catalonia Grand Prix was made to buy Mercedes time to analyze the situation, as FIA rules allow teams a limited time to submit review requests.
Then there is a longer period in which one party decides to continue with them.
A Mercedes spokesman said: “It was important for us to explore all options to mitigate the impact of George Pit-Lane’s speeding penalty on the result.
“We had some time to apply for review rights during the race weekend in Barcelona, and we did this to maintain our position in this regard.
Our ongoing collaborative discussions with the FIA and Formula 1 have demonstrated their commitment to assessing the exceptional circumstances arising from the Monaco Grand Prix and proactively addressing the root causes.
“In the face of this clear commitment, we have concluded that further pursuit of our review application will not benefit our team or the sport and we have withdrawn it.”
