Lando Norris hammered with five-place grid penalty for Turkish GP

Turkish Grand Prix

Norris hammered with five-place grid penalty for Turkish GP

McLaren driver had originally qualified 11th in Istanbul

Sam Hall

Saturday 14 November 2020 18:16

Lando Norris has been hammered by the Turkish Grand Prix race stewards with a five-place grid penalty for ignoring yellow flags during the first phase of qualifying.

It means the team has now suffered a double-whammy at Istanbul Park after Carlos Sainz was hit with a three-place penalty for blocking Sergio Perez.

Norris' infringement came as he completed his final push lap in Q1 as the Briton - who celebrated his 21st birthday on Friday - failed to respect double-waved yellow flags being shown to protect Nicholas Latifi after the Williams driver had spun off into the gravel.

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The stewards report read: "The Stewards heard from the driver of car 4 [Lando Norris], the team representative and have reviewed video, radio, telemetry and marshalling system evidence.

"Car 4 approached turn eight which was under double-waved yellow flags for car 6 [Nicolas Latifi].

"Telemetry shows that car 4 slowed in the sector and resumed speed after the incident. Car 4 then asked his team if he should abort the lap, but was told to stay out because of the rapidly changing track conditions. Car 4 completed the lap, which turned out to be his fastest lap of Q1.

"While the stewards acknowledge that car 4 was not attempting to set a quick lap time, due to the changing track conditions, he nevertheless did so and thereby breached the referenced regulations."

The revised grid order now places Sebastian Vettel 11th ahead of Ferrari team-mate Charles Leclerc, AlphaTauri's Pierre Gasly and Haas' Kevin Magnussen, with Sainz and Norris 15th and 16th respectively.

Prior to receiving his penalty, Norris warned the low-grip Istanbul asphalt could cause a turn-one pile-up during the race.

“[There is] Probably quite a high possibility of a crash or something because we struggle just as much in the dry almost as we do in the wet to get the tyres in and at a good temperature, especially when you’re not on a soft tyre," said Norris. “Having a warm-up lap, you’re instead going to be cooling the tyres down, so it kind of defeats the object of it, which is going to cause more chaos than everyone is expecting going into turn one.

“It’s also not a long run into turn one. It’s one of the shortest of the whole season.

“I don’t think you’re going to see anyone diving in because there’s not going to be the high speeds but I think it’s very easy to make mistakes and probably lock a front tyre or let the rear snap round because the tyres are cold.

“It should be exciting. We just have to try and stay out of the carnage.”