Stewards in Austria have deemed that no further action is warranted following first lap crash.

Having spoken to both drivers and studied video evidence, stewards at the Red Bull Ring have deemed that no further action is necessary following yesterday's first lap crash involving Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen.

The Finn, who qualified 18th but started 14th once the numerous penalties had been meted out, initially appeared to have been hit from behind by the Spaniard who - being the recipient of some of those penalties - started from 19th.

Alonso made a strong start and whilst it was originally suggested that he ran into the back of the Ferrari causing the incident, it soon became clear that in fact Raikkonen lost control of his car and veered across the track collecting the hapless Spaniard.

"I don't know exactly what happened before the crash," said the Finn, "I had some wheel-spin in an unusual place. I was at a quite high speed, suddenly went left and end up there. I did not see anything coming, everything happened very quickly."

"Kimi ahead of me had started on the prime tyre, and he exited turn two with a lot of wheel-spin," said Alonso. "I went to overtake him and he lost the car to the left, and that's exactly where I was - so we both went into the wall.

"Luckily, we're both fine. It was a strange incident, because he lost the car in fifth gear, so it must have been very low grip."

The incident brought a miserable weekend to a close for the Spaniard, who, like his teammate, had been hit with a 25-place grid penalty.

Whilst the stewards deemed that "no driver was at fault" and consequently "no further action is warranted", there is concern that the incident will impact McLaren's plans for this week's second in-season test.

A number of updates had been provided for Alonso's car only including a revised nose and front and rear wings, all were damaged in the incident. It's feared that replacements, which were not available for teammate Jenson Button at the weekend, might not be ready for the test which begins tomorrow.

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READERS COMMENTS

1. Posted by Will Fly, 23/06/2015 6:12

"I feel sorry for Kimi, he's had a tough time at Ferrari, they messed up the timing of the Quali run which put him in harms way at the back of the grid, Ok he could have been a bit more gentle on cold prime tyres on lap one, but if you don't push it's hard to make up the places you lose. I'm glad to see that both kimi and Alonso show hands straight after the incident, it would have been far to easy to start pushing and shoving but they both showed great maturity and it was good to hear other people were only concerned with the safety of the drivers and nothing to do with the cars. I hope Kimi and Alonso start to get some more promising results for the remainder of the season, otherwise I think maybe The Hulk might find himself in a red suit next year."

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2. Posted by F1 Yank, 22/06/2015 16:05

"After watching the replays it appeared that RAI's tires were cold and he had very little traction upon acceleration causing his car to weave and collected ALO. It is known that many passes are made during the first lap, that is why the starts of F1 races are so exciting. I am hoping for the best with RAI/Ferrari but his 2015 track record is not where it should be. Some incidents can be excluded but others must be avoided to maximize points for the team."

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No further action on Alonso/Raikkonen clash

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