Joe Portlock/Motorsport Images
Lola Yamaha Abt hit with penalties over broken MGU seals
Both Lola Yamaha Abt entries will start the first race of the Jeddah E-Prix with 20-place grid penalties.
The stewards determined that the team broke the seals on both E-Motors (MGU) were broken on both the No. 11 car of Lucas di Grassi and the No. 22 of Zane Maloney, with that being deemed as “changing a part” per the regulations.
They noted that “The competitor faced several technical issues with its MGU during the past events of this season. Therefore, they asked for permission to break the seals of two MGUs to the Technical Delegate to perform safety checks and solve the issue.” The same comment was made in separate stewards' bulletins detailing each penalty.
With the Formula E grid comprising 22 cars, full application of the penalty for each driver is unlikely. Therefore, as per the regulations, a drive-through penalty will also be applied to make up for 1-10 places each driver can’t be demoted on the grid, or a stop-and-go penalty if they can’t drop 11 or more places.
Lola Yamaha Abt has endured a tough start to the season, with Maloney taking 12th in the season opener in Sao Paulo before finishing 15th in Mexico City. Di Grassi, meanwhile, retired from the season opener and was classified 20th last time out.
Maloney was 20th in the first practice session of the Jeddah race weekend and di Grassi was 21st, with both drivers suffering from setup issues. Ahead of that session, Tatiana Calderon was 10th of 11 drivers participating in the Rookie Free Practice Session.
Dominik Wilde
Dominik often jokes that he was born in the wrong country – a lover of NASCAR and IndyCar, he covered both in a past life as a junior at Autosport in the UK, but he’s spent most of his career to date covering the sliding and flying antics of the U.S.’ interpretation of rallycross. Rather fitting for a man that says he likes “seeing cars do what they’re not supposed to do”, previously worked for a car stunt show, and once even rolled a rally car with Travis Pastrana. He was also comprehensively beaten in a kart race by Sebastien Loeb once, but who hasn’t been?
Read Dominik Wilde's articles
Latest News
Comments
Comments are disabled until you accept Social Networking Cookies. Update cookie preferences
If the dialog doesn't appear, ad-blockers are often the cause; try disabling yours or see our Social Features Support.