Liam Lawson makes 'my bad' admission after 'boring' Abu Dhabi GP

Liam Lawson has conceded his five-second time penalty at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix was "probably" his "bad" after the stewards took a dim view of his defence against Oliver Bearman.

The Racing Bulls driver was punished for "driving erratically" when fighting the Briton in the opening stages at the Yas Marina Circuit, which contributed to him falling to P18 by the chequered flag.

Although the incident was not picked up on the broadcast world feed, the official stewards' document confirmed that "Car 30 made several erratic moves between turns 8 and 9 as Car 87 was approaching."

Bearman had got alongside the New Zealander through the Turn 6-7 chicane and was in the slipstream of the VCARB 02 down the subsequent straight when Lawson pulled across in front of the Haas, almost putting it into the wall.

He was also handed a penalty point on his FIA super licence, taking him up to six of 12 allowed over a rolling 12-month period.

When asked about the incident by RacingNews365 post-race, Lawson explained: "I was defending him.

"To be fair, I moved quite late, so it was probably my bad. It wasn't intentional, but I guess that's why I got the penalty."

After lining up P13, Lawson was run long into the race, which included a short-lived battle with Lando Norris, who had already pitted, on his way to winning his first F1 drivers' championship.

But it was an otherwise uneventful season finale for him, having been unable to match the pace of departing team-mate Isack Hadjar across the weekend.

Reflecting on the rest of the contest, he added: "But yeah, I haven't really seen anything else. It was a pretty boring afternoon."