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Verstappen's Abu Dhabi penalty too harsh? 'That doesn't make sense!'
- Estéban den Toom
Giedo van der Garde thinks Max Verstappen was punished too heavily for his incident with Oscar Piastri at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. In the first corner of the final race of the season, the Dutchman dived down the inside of the Australian into Turn 1. There was a small gap, but that gap quickly closed, meaning Verstappen understeered and hit the McLaren, receiving a 10-second penalty.
The incident between Verstappen and Piastri would have divided opinions, with some believing that it could have been viewed as a racing incident, while others believed that a ten-second penalty was correct, with Piastri tumbling all the way down the order due to the collision. Van der Garde is of the opinion that it was too harsh of a penalty.
The former Formula 1 driver did not understand the FIA's thinking at all. "Surely it's never worth ten seconds? But surely not two penalty points on your license either? Surely that doesn't make sense. I really don't understand what the FIA is doing. I think it was a racing incident because there was just a gap. He just went for it," Van der Garde said in DRS: The Race Show.
Van der Garde on Verstappen's penalty
"Very honestly, okay, maybe in the middle of the corner, he thought: 'S***. But if Piastri had just given space, there would have been nothing wrong. Now it went wheel-to-wheel, Piastri spun and he spun too. I did think the penalty was too harsh. This was not 10 seconds, but five seconds, and certainly not two points on the license."
Verstappen finished the very last Grand Prix of the Formula 1 season in sixth place. Piastri did not come out of the incident with the Red Bull driver well, finishing in the tenth place in Abu Dhabi.
This article was written in collaboration with Olly Darcy
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