Aston Martin team principal Mike Krack has labelled Lance Stroll’s “very harsh” at the F1 Chinese Grand Prix.
The Canadian made big contact with Daniel Ricciardo at the Turn 14 hairpin as the Safety Car period ended and the race restarted.
Stroll was given a 10-second time penalty as a seething Ricciardo retired, and his compatriot Oscar Piastri suffered diffuser damage to his McLaren in the incident.
Krack said on the crash: “I thought it was very, very fast and very harsh, very quick decision. But this is how it is.”
The 52-year-old added that he feels Aston Martin was fortunate to keep both cars running as Alonso almost clattered into Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari.
“I think it was a chain reaction in the end of the day. You saw Fernando locking and another car behind, and I think everybody was a little bit caught out.
“I think at that stage, we were happy that we did not lose both cars because I think it started further to the front.
“I would have liked that this would have been looked at in a little bit more detailed way. We tried to discuss it, but the verdict was very quickly that Lance was to blame, and he got a 10-second penalty, additionally to the front-way damage.”
Both Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso and Stroll have accumulated penalty points in recent races, with the pair holding six and seven points respectively. Acquiring 12 penalty points results in a race ban.
Krack pointed out that some incidents over the Chinese Grand Prix weekend saw the stewards take no action, such as Sainz forcing Leclerc off in the sprint, whereas Alonso was quickly given a 10-second penalty in the Sprint for the incident with Sainz.
“At the end of the day, we had a quite hard fight and we had the worst end of it at the end of the day.
“Then you get another penalty where you say, If we have a sprint of 19 laps, we want to see what we saw. I thought it was great racing.
“Even if we have the worst end of it, it was still a great race in the sprint. Then spending hours with the stewards again, you feel at that point that it is not fair. Maybe we sleep tonight and have a look at it again, we see it differently.
“But again, you have yesterday’s incident, then you have an incident today where people are pushing another car off in turn six, and then there is no action. Or we had the two Ferraris pushing one another off, not leaving the gap. There was no action. Fernando, straight away, 10 seconds [penalty].”
