An ill-tempered practice session in Barcelona on Saturday morning saw Lance Stroll appear to make contact with Lewis Hamilton on purpose before Charles Leclerc did the same to Lando Norris
Lance Stroll has escaped a grid penalty for the Spanish Grand Prix despite admitting to driving into Lewis Hamilton on purpose.
The incident happened during final practice on Saturday ahead of qualifying for the Barcelona race. Hamilton got in the way of the Aston Martin driver on track which led to Stroll losing his temper.
The Canadian yelled over the radio, complaining: “This f***ing guy thinks he’s alone on the track!” Hamilton had apologised over the airwaves for impeding Stroll but then got a whack on the side of his Mercedes from his fellow driver.
TV footage suggested that Stroll might have caused the contact on purpose. And he admitted as much as he went to see the stewards to tell his side of the story
Yet, he avoided a sporting sanction for his actions. Stroll was given a reprimand, his first of the season, and the stewards explained in an official FIA document how they arrived at that decision.
They wrote: “The driver of Car 18 [Stroll] stated that he got impeded by Car 44 [Hamilton] into turn five and that upset him. He admitted that he wanted to express his displeasure to the other driver by pulling over on him at the exit. Both cars made slight contact which was incidental.
“However, the Stewards consider the move made by Car 18, whilst not being dangerous, to be erratic and therefore issue a driving reprimand in line with precedents.”
The incident between Stroll and Hamilton was far from the only one in an ill-tempered end to the practice session. Shortly after their coming-together, Charles Leclerc also appeared to do something similar to Lando Norris after feeling he had been impeded by the McLaren driver.
Leclerc also escaped a grid penalty for his actions and, like Stroll, was given a reprimand. The stewards explained: “The driver of Car 16 [Leclerc] stated that he got impeded by Car 4 [Norris] into turn five and that upset him. He then had to abort his flying lap and contended that, while trying to get off the racing line before turn seven, he misjudged the position of his car and made slight contact with Car 4.
“Irrespective of any possible intent, the stewards consider the move made by Car 16, whilst not being dangerous, to be erratic and therefore issue a driving reprimand in line with precedents.”
