Penalty sees Leclerc lose seventh place to Lawson for late Sao Paulo contact

Charles Leclerc has lost seventh place in the Sao Paulo Grand Prix to Liam Lawson for causing contact with the Racing Bulls car late in the race.

Lawson started third, and an excellent opening lap saw him run second before he started to fade against quicker cars the longer the race went on. After dropping to seventh in the closing stages, Lawson was defending from Leclerc on the penultimate lap when the Ferrari driver tried to overtake down the inside into Juncao – the final braking point – and hit the left rear of Lawson’s car, pushing him slightly wide and managing to complete the move at the start of the final lap.

Leclerc crossed the line just under two seconds clear of Lawson, but the stewards handed the Monegasque a five-second time penalty that reverts the positions to seventh for Lawson and eighth for Leclerc.

“While the contact was minor and Car 30 was able to maintain the lead thereafter, the driver of Car 30 claimed that the contact damaged the rear left rim of his car and also enabled Car 16 to get closer to him on track and then eventually overtake him five corners later,” the stewards’ decision read. “Furthermore, under the Driving Standard Guidelines, Car 30 had the right to the corner and it was for Car 16 to take the necessary steps to avoid a collision.

“The driver of Car 16 claimed that it was a minor contact with no obvious sporting consequence.

“While we acknowledge that the contact was minor, having examined the fight on track between the two cars, we conclude that Car 16 was able to get closer to and thereafter overtake Car 30 because of the contact. The contact clearly disrupted Car 30 and allowed Car 16 to pull up alongside when it was further away before the contact. This was an obvious sporting consequence.

“In mitigation, the wet conditions coupled with the nature of the contact (i.e. minor) was taken into account in imposing a five second time penalty as opposed to a 10 second time penalty.”

Lawson did not elaborate too much on the contact prior to the stewards’ decision, but was pleased with his performance in a race he admitted he had felt he had a chance of leading early on.

“It was a good start,” Lawson said. “Just had really good grip on Lap 1. To be honest, I actually thought at some point I might try and attack Kimi through the lap. But once the pace stabilizes, we don't really have the speed to fight them. So, yeah, we started to fall back. But where I could today, I tried to fight with those guys. It was good fun.”