Max Verstappen has kept his pole position for Saturday’s sprint race at the Marina Bay circuit in Singapore.
The stewards ruled the Red Bull driver did overtake Lewis Hamilton under yellow flags but chose not to penalise him.They determined the Red Bull driver was already approaching Hamilton’s car at speed when the yellow flags were displayed. They accepted Verstappen’s explanation that he would have had to slow sharply to avoid passing Hamilton.
Stewards’ decision on Verstappen
As car three [Verstappen] was exiting turn seven on a push lap, a single yellow flag was displayed. Car 44 [Hamilton] was ahead of car three and had been warned of car three’s approach. The driver of car 44 said that after exiting turn seven, he slowed and moved to the right to ensure he was off the racing line. Car three overtook car 44 prior to turn eight while both cars were still in the yellow flag sector. Car three then abandoned the push lap.
The driver of car three explained that he was on throttle exiting turn seven and then saw the yellow flag and lifted. This was confirmed by telemetry. Within approximately 40 metres of entering the yellow flag sector, the driver of car three had lifted fully off throttle. The driver of car 44 was braking and had reduced speed to less than 60km/h at the point car three overtook. Because car three was on a push lap and was on throttle out of turn seven and car 44 had slowed, the speed differential at the point of the overlap was significant despite the fact that the driver of car three had also started braking.
The stewards were satisfied that the driver of car three reacted appropriately to the yellow flag by lifting off throttle and reducing speed. The speed of car three at the overtake point was some 70km/h less than car three’s speed on another push lap in the same session. The driver of car three explained that to have avoided the overtake would have required him to have braked very heavily and he considered to have done so would have potentially created an unsafe situation.
The stewards determined that the driver of car three breached the yellow flag regulation by overtaking car 44. However, the stewards were satisfied that the overtake was an unfortunate consequence of the significant closing speed differential and, in these circumstances, determined not to impose a penalty.
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