Cadillac has been handed a €30,000 fine, €25,000 of which is suspended by F1 stewards for a rules breach after Colton Herta stopped on track during Free Practice 1 - and also warned teams of possible future sporting sanctions.
The American was deputising for Sergio Perez in his third FP1 outing of the season when he stopped exiting the second Lesmo corner with about 40 minutes remaining in the session.
Although he had stopped by a marshal's post, the session was upgraded from a virtual safety car to a red flag after the MAC-26 machine could not be moved with the clutch still engaged, with the team describing the problem as a hydraulics issue.
Herta was subsequently called to the stewards over an alleged breach of Article C9.3 of the technical regulations
This states that "all cars must be fitted with a means of disengaging the clutch for a minimum of 15 minutes in the event of the car coming to rest with the engine stopped" and that this must be “in working order throughout the Competition even if the main hydraulic, pneumatic or electrical systems on the car have failed."
In Canada, Racing Bulls was handed a €30,000 fine, €20,000 of which was suspended for 12 months, following a similar breach of Article C9.3 by Liam Lawson.
In Monaco, McLaren received a similar sanction after Lando Norris's car failed in practice and was unable to be moved.
In judging against Cadillac and Herta, with the hearing delayed until Saturday morning to allow the team more time to gather data and information, the stewards found that a third-party part failure had caused the issue - and warned that after the third CDS failure of the season, sporting penalties could soon be handed out.
The Stewards heard from the team Sporting Director and team Head of Reliability, and the FIA Technical Delegate and FIA F1 Electronics Engineer.
The team presented detailed schematics of how the CDS system was designed and installed.
The Stewards were satisfied that the system was designed to operate independently of the car’s other systems, as required by the regulations.
The team demonstrated to the Stewards’ satisfaction, that the system had been checked and tested on the day prior to the commencement of competition. However the operation of the CDS when the car’s electronic system is turned off (“P0 mode”) depends on a lithium battery provided by a third party supplier.
The team was able to demonstrate, again to the Stewards’ satisfaction, that one of the four cells in this battery had failed. This in turn caused the CDS to be inoperable and hence when the car came to a halt, it could not be easily pushed from the circuit, resulting in the display of a red flag.
The team stated that as a result of the incident it would firstly obtain from the battery supplier, information as to the expected maximum battery life, and would instigate daily or pre-session checks, plus a replacement battery programme to ensure the likelihood of future failures was minimised.
The FIA Regulations state: “This system must be in working order throughout the Competition even if the main hydraulic, pneumatic or electrical systems on the car have failed.”
The Stewards accept that the team has been completely transparent in its disclosures and that the plan outlined above is a reasonable approach. However a breach of the regulation has occurred, and although the reason for this can be attributed to the failure of a third party supplied part, overall responsibility for compliance still rests with the team and accordingly a penalty is imposed.
The Stewards note that this is the third reported failure of a CDS this season. Again, this failure resulted in a red flag being displayed which had sporting consequences.
Although in this case the Stewards have decided to impose a monetary penalty, Competitors are advised that because the CDS is a critical component and designed to facilitate the safe and quick removal of a car from the circuit, future failures may incur not only monetary penalties but sporting penalties as well.
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