Masi: "The rules are clear and Vettel should have known"

The opening race of the season in Bahrain was one to forget for Sebastian Vettel. The German failed to reach Q2 in qualifying, was relegated to last place on the grid and crashed with Esteban Ocon in the race on Sunday. Still, many people found the grid penalty Vettel received during qualifying very harsh.

Aware of no evil

Vettel himself was not aware of any wrongdoing. According to the Heppenheimer he didn't step off the gas because he wasn't sure if someone had just blocked his wheels or stopped because of the thick smoke. Later, when the clouds of smoke had cleared, the four-time world champion saw Nikita Mazepin standing along the track and braked.

Masi is clear

Race director Michael Masi, on the other hand, says he does not agree with the criticism of Vettel's penalty. "With Sebastian, two yellow flags were shown and not one. That is a very important point. The regulations state that a driver is expected to abandon his lap or at least not set a significant lap time. These rules are clear and Sebastian knew that," he says to Speedweek.com. "In addition, we had clearly pointed out this rule to the drivers during the briefing."

Masi continues, "Bottas was also close to Mazepin and did abandon his attempt. Vettel went ahead and set a time that was almost not slower than his previous attempt. At that point we had no choice but to penalise Sebastian, as we have done many times in recent years."