Red Bull’s Max Verstappen drives during yesterday's practice.
Doha: Formula One stewards rejected yesterday a Mercedes request to review a decision not to penalise Red Bull’s championship leader Max Verstappen for a Sao Paulo Grand Prix incident with Lewis Hamilton.
They said in a statement ahead of the Ooredoo Qatar Grand Prix that while Mercedes had presented new and relevant video evidence from Interlagos, it was not significant.
To meet the conditions for a Right of Review under the sporting code, a team must present evidence that is significant, relevant, new and that was previously unavailable to the parties concerned.
Seven times world champion Hamilton won the race at Interlagos last Sunday.
The pair went off track on lap 48 as Hamilton tried to pass and Verstappen defended aggressively in a move that the Briton’s Mercedes team felt should have drawn a time penalty for the Dutch youngster. Had they done so retrospectively, Verstappen risked losing more points.
The stewards took note of the incident during the race but concluded, on the basis of the evidence they had, that no investigation was necessary.
