The Aston Martin F1 team has lodged an official protest against the result of qualifying for the Chinese GP. The protest is a response to Carlos Sainz’s crash during qualifying and the fact that Sainz then continued driving.
Aston Martin lodges a protest under rule 39.6 of the Sporting Regulations. Rule 39.6 of the regulations states that ‘a driver may not continue in the session if the car comes to a stop on the track during a qualifying session’. At Aston Martin they want all lap times that Carlos Sainz drove after the red flag to be deleted.
Carlos Sainz spun during Q2, then hit the tire wall and indeed came to a halt. A red flag followed but Sainz was able to pull away again and drove to the pit lane. In the Ferrari garage, the mechanics then managed to repair Sainz’s car. Sainz then set the third fastest time and managed to advance to Q3.
Remarkably, it would not be the first time that a driver came to a standstill during qualifying and was then able to continue driving. Aston Martin’s protest seems mainly to want to ‘take revenge’ for an incident between Sainz and Alonso that took place this morning during the sprint race and for which Fernando Alonso was severely punished.