Lando Norris and George Russell have both been fined €5,000 and given reprimands for leaving the grid even though the aborted start signal had been given.

The Race Director initiated the aborted start procedure indicating that drivers should not leave the grid as Lance Stroll was off track in Turn 4 and needed to be recovered.

Although the signal was appropriately given the light panel illuminated as prescribed, and the teams notified by the messaging system, Norris and Russell left the grid and proceeded on a lap that they assumed to be an extra formation lap.

As they were on the front row of the grid this triggered some of the following drivers to take similar action.

The race director, realizing that for practical reasons all cars would now need to do an extra formation lap, gave an instruction to the teams for all cars to proceed and return to the grid to follow the correct aborted start procedure.

In the opinion of the stewards Norris and Russell precipitated the action of the drivers on the grid directly behind them and as a result both were fined €5,000 and given reprimands.

Though Liam Lawson and Yuki Tsunoda, who were behind Norris and Russell, breached the regulations this was influenced by the drivers ahead of them and as such were not predominately responsible for the breach.

As such the stewards decided to take no further action against the RB pair having held the drivers immediately ahead as being at fault.

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READERS COMMENTS

1. Posted by Wokingchap, 8 hours ago

"It's simple....lights should've been RED."

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2. Posted by Schrodinger's cat, 8 hours ago

"Forget the penalties. What this episode showed is that the FIA race controllers are amateurs.

Every driver and team should have been briefed, about potential scenarios, such an aborted start, or an abandoned start, so that everyone was well informed about what to do, in such an event, given the weather.

This event showed, that that had not happened!

@Pavlo, doesn't a red flag mean to enter the pits at the end of your current lap, not stop on track wherever you are. We definitely don't want red flags to have different meanings depending on the situation."

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3. Posted by Pavlo, 11 hours ago

"I think Lando should say thanks to George. Had George stayed, it would have left no options for stewards.
I have only one question to the stewards - how came that "aborted start" is signaled with yellow/white light, instead of red lights? If the light would turn red, it would be clear to Lando that he is not allowed to drive. If we talk about safety of marshals, the best thing is to have non-ambigous lights."

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4. Posted by givememychoice, 16 hours ago

"When Hamilton entered a closed pit at monza 2020, he received a 10s stop and go penalty.
Sainz fined 25000 for crossing a live track at singapore.

I would put it at a similar level to Hamilton. Entering an area of track that has been deemed closed. Risking marshalls. (and if you say he was only going pace lap speed, that was enough for Lance to lose control in the first place).
Even if you dont view it as particularly bad, I cant see how Sainz running across a live track, endangering himself, is 5 times worse than endangering a group of marshalls.
"

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5. Posted by Stitch431, 18 hours ago

"The stewards for Lando! ... If this would have been Max ... Dear FIA, please provide us with impartial stewards for the remaining races. Thank you."

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6. Posted by kenji, 22 hours ago

"This decision by the Stewards reeks of selective treatment. As all the prior posters have mentioned there was no need to postpone the delivery of the penalties in a timely fashion and closer to the beginning of the race? That would allow other teams to raise problems if needs be. Just imagine the outcome if it was Max who'd led the grid off like Norris did? I have one question that needs to be followed up. Who told Norris to start the lap? Was it his sole decision or was he informed to proceed by the pitwall? "

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7. Posted by Batman, 04/11/2024 0:26

"The same as always. Decisions made according to who and when. At least they're consistent."

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8. Posted by Kkiirmki, 04/11/2024 0:10

"Why have these penalties (including the Mercedes tyre issue raised in an earlier article) taken so long to decide, if they only intended to issue paltry fines? If regulations were broken, even if it was by the majority of the field, then they should all be penalised with a time penalty of some kind. Does it have something to do with Johnny Herbert being one of the stewards, and the penalties being issued to British drivers, especially Norris? I'm sure a lot of people will be aware of his obvious biases. Would the stewards have been so lenient if Verstappen was the driver in question?"

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9. Posted by Pavlo, 03/11/2024 23:45

"It all gives a bad impression that stewards decided to avoid penalising Lando as he had a chance to win the race and keep championship interesting. As I understood from the documents, only 4 first drivers actually broke the rules, seeing them race director ordered others to drive.
I don't understand why such decisions must be made after the race, they had enough time to decide."

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10. Posted by Burton, 03/11/2024 23:33

"I would have given penalties and penalty points to all the transgressors, and if that's the entire field then so be it! What is this excusing dangerous driving nonsense?!"

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Norris and Russell fined for aborted start infringement

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