RB driver Yuki Tsunoda is under investigation by FIA officials and race stewards for radio comments he was heard to make during today's qualifying session for the Austrian Grand at the Red Bull Ring in Spielberg.
Tsunoda made it through to the second round of qualifying n Saturday and finished in 14th place, but he was not happy with drivers jockeying for position on pit lane at the end of Q1 with the clock counting down.
Tsunoda was queueing in the fast lane when he was overtaken by Zhou Guanyu who had been waved out of the Sauber pits a team mechanic. "These guys are f***ing r***rds," he was heard to say over the RB team radio.
The incident was spotted by fans on social media and reported to FIA officials who determined that it should be formally referred to the race stewards as a potential breach of Article 12.2.1.f of the FIA's International Sporting Code.
This relates to "any words, deeds or writings that have caused moral injury or loss to the FIA, its bodies, its members or its executive officers, and more generally on the interest of motorsport and on the values defended by the FIA".
The language is similar to that used by Max Verstappen to refer to Lance Stroll at the 2020 Portuguese GP. On that occasion neither Verstappen nor Red Bull were sanctioned or directed to make a full formal apology.
However Mercedes and Ferrari team bosses Toto Wolff and Frederic Vasseur were given formal warnings under Article 12.2.1.f for swearing during a press conference at the 2023 Las Vegas Grand Prix.
The stewards were already having a busy evening in Austria with a number of incidents picked up for post-qualifying analysis.
The stewards took no action against Verstappen after looking into whether he drove unnecessarily slowly when he left the pits at the end of Q3.
At the end of Q3, Verstappen created a gap of 14 seconds to the car in front of him but the stewards noted that “in this case no other car was directly affected by this in their attempts to set a lap time" and other cars had done the same.
However the stewards did add a note to their decision suggesting the introduction of a new rule limiting how large a gap drivers should be allowed to create in future.
In a separate matter, Mercedes was fined €5,000 for releasing Lewis Hamilton's car in an unsafe condition on pit lane when he dragged a jack and exhaust extractor into the pits as he left at the start of Q3.
"The team immediately informed the driver to stop to prevent any further damage and/or dangerous situation," the stewards noted.
Nico Hulkenberg was also summoned over two separate incidents of failing to follow race director Niels Wittich’s instructions for how cars blended into the queue of traffic departing pit lane.
Haas were reprimanded for telling Hulkenberg to merge into the queue ahead of Daniel Ricciardo during Q1, but there was no action over a second incident between Hulkenberg and Sergio Perez in Q2.
In the latter case, the stewards ruled that “at the time [Hulkenberg] entered the fast lane there was no suitable gap to blend in. However, this was caused by another car stopping right in front of [Hulkenberg] at the moment the driver wanted to do so.
"The stewards conclude that the driver started to merge into the fast lane anticipating that there would be a suitable gap but this was prevented by the other car stopping at exactly this moment.”
The stewards are also looking into a protest from McLaren over the deletion of Oscar Piastri's final lap time in qualifying. It meant that Piastri dropped from third to seventh on the provisional grid for tomorrow's race.
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