Lewis Hamilton, Charles Leclerc and Pierre Gasly have all been disqualified from the F1 Chinese GP, the FIA has announced.
This comes after Leclerc and Gasly’s cars were both found to be under the minimum weight set out by FIA regulations, while Hamilton suffered skid wear that exceeded the permitted level.
Charles Leclerc and Pierre Gasly
Leclerc and Gasly’s cars were summoned following the race, where they finished P5 and P11 respectively. Both cars needed to reach the minimum weight of 800kg, with the driver included, but they both fell short at 799kg once their fuel had been drained.
Leclerc had lost a piece of his front wing following a collision with teammate Hamilton during the race, however the FIA confirmed that this had been recovered and accounted for in the overall weight, both with the original piece and with a spare front wing from Ferrari.
Following the hearing from the stewards, neither Ferrari nor Alpine contested the findings, and their drivers subsequently both received disqualifications from the race.
In a statement released on social media, Ferrari offered an explanation for the breach:
“Charles was on a one-stop strategy today and this meant his tyre wear was very high, causing the car to be underweight.”
Lewis Hamilton
After finishing in sixth place, Lewis Hamilton was also summoned to the stewards following the Chinese GP, as questions were raised around the excessive wear to his rear skid block.
According to the FIA’s report, measurements were taken across three different areas of Hamilton’s rearmost skid:
“The recorded measurements were 8.6mm (LHS), 8.6mm (car centreline) and 8.5mm (RHS).”
The minimum thickness set out in the FIA’s technical regulations is 9mm. This breach meant that Ferrari was summoned to stewards, and Hamilton was handed a disqualification shortly after.
According to Ferrari, the team “misjudged the [skid wear] consumption by a small margin.”
Nightmare for Ferrari
It’s a weekend Ferrari will want to forget, with both cars disqualified for separate technical reasons meaning that they come away with no points towards the championship.
While Hamilton recorded a triumphant win in Saturday’s Sprint race, it’ll count for very little given the significant loss of points from Sunday’s Grand Prix.
In response to the disqualifications, the team stated:
“There was no intention to gain any advantage. We will learn from what happened today and make sure we don’t make the same mistakes again.
“Clearly it’s not the way we wanted to end out Chinese GP weekend, neither for ourselves, nor for our fans whose support for us is unwavering.”
Ferrari currently sits fourth in the Constructors’ Championship, trailing behind their main rivals with a total of 35 points.
Following this weekend, McLaren has worked to create a significant gap, with 78 points compared with Mercedes’ 53. Red Bull sits just one point ahead of Ferrari, after Liam Lawson failed to score points in the two opening races of the season.
