Liam Lawson returns to F1 at the United States Grand Prix this weekend with a grid penalty - through no fault of his own.
Lawson has been named as Daniel Ricciardo's replacement for the final six rounds of the season, with the Kiwi harbouring hopes of landing a 2025 Red Bull drive if he can out-perform Yuki Tsunoda in the two triple-headers.
However, Lawson's bid start offs on the backfoot as he is due to take an engine penalty originally ear-marked for Ricciardo.
Of the components that make up an F1 power unit, drivers are allowed four examples each of the internal combustion engine (ICE), turbocharger, MGU-H, and MGU-K with two control electronics and energy stores also permitted.
After round 18 of the season in Singapore, Ricciardo was up to the maximum of each component, with a penalty looming over him to ensure he could get through the rest of the season.
But one section of the sporting regulations means Lawson serves this penalty for taking the new components, even though he has not used any of them.
Article 28.4 of the sporting regulations states that: "If a driver is replaced at any time during the Championship his replacement will be deemed to be the original driver for the purposes of assessing Power Unit usage."
This means that the power unit components belong to the car rather than the driver.
It is to prevent teams from simply swapping drivers out to get a fresh allocation of power unit components at a potentially advantageous grand prix - such as the Italian, for example.
It means that when Oliver Bearman subbed in for the suspended Kevin Magnussen in Azerbaijan, he took over Magnussen's existing allocation of components instead of starting afresh.
Lawson will serve his penalty in the main grand prix on Sunday. He is unaffected in the sprint unless he picks up a further penalty related to the shorter race.
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