BORTOLETO HANDED FIVE-PLACE GRID PENALTY FOR HIS COLLISION WITH STROLL

Following his ambitious move at the start at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Kick Sauber driver Gabriel Bortoleto has been handed a five-place grid penalty for next weekend's Qatar round.

Kick Sauber Bortoleto looked overly optimistic at the start, braking much later than his rivals as he approached the first coner. Braking late, he locked up and seemed to collide with the Aston Martin of Lance Stroll who sent the Alpine of Pierre Gasly into a spin.

While the Brazilian limped round for two laps, the damage on his car was too great and he pulled into the pits to retire for the second straight race.

The stewards investigated the matter and elected to hand out a five-place grid penalty to Bortoleto who will serve it at next weekend's Qatar Grand Prix.

„The Stewards reviewed positioning/marshalling system data and video evidence. The driver of Car 5 braked extremely late and as a result collided with Car 18.

„Even though this was a Lap 1 Turn 1 incident, mitigating circumstances do not exist and hence the standard 10 second penalty would have applied however as Car 5 retired, the penalty is converted into a grid penalty for the next Race in which the driver participates, in accordance with our guidelines," read the FIA's statement.

Reflecting on his unfortunate mistake at the start of the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Bortoleto admitted that he "misjudged the braking point by a few metres."

“First of all, I would like to apologise to Lance [Stroll]. It was my fault – I had a strong launch and went for a move on the inside of the Williams, but by the time I committed, I misjudged the braking point by a few meters and it was already too late to slow the car down properly.

"I went in a bit long, had no angle to make the corner, and ended up hitting him. It’s a shame, because the weekend seemed promising until qualifying, and then the mistake on lap one ruined both our races.

"I just need to put everything together now for the remaining two races of the season – clean laps, clean weekends – because not finishing these last two races meant losing track experience I should have been gaining. I’ll learn from this, reset, and make sure to come back to the performance levels I've shown before as we come to Doha next week.”

- Balazs Szabo