Gabriele Minì receives a 3-place grid penalty, thus losing his pole position.
Just a few hours after securing pole position, Gabriele Minì’s excitement is quickly dampened: the FIA has just announced a 3-place grid penalty for the Palermo-born driver, to be served in both the Sprint Race and the Feature Race.
The reason for the penalty is impeding in turn 11 by Gabriele Minì’s Prema against Jak Crawford’s DAMS in the final stages of the session. After hearing both drivers and team representatives, and reviewing the available video evidence and telemetry data, the Stewards determined that Minì had unnecessarily impeded Crawford, violating Article 31.6 of the Sporting Regulations.
The pole position for the Feature Race is now in the hands of Victor Martins, who will be joined on the front row by Richard Verschoor from MP Motorsport, taking advantage of Jak Crawford’s 10-place grid penalty. In Sunday’s race, Minì moves to the second row, alongside Roman Stanek from Invicta Racing. In tomorrow’s race, however, where the other Italian, Leonardo Fornaroli, will start from pole, the Palermo-born driver will line up in 13th place.
PHOTO: FIA Formula 2.