F1: Zhou given Pitlane start penalty for sprint crash

Zhou Guanyu will start the Formula 1 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix from the pitlane after Alfa Romeo repaired his car under parc ferme conditions following his sprint race crash.

Clearly a violation of the rules, Zhou is not forced to start from pitlane for today’s race.

The Alfa Romeo team prepare Zhou’s car to take the Sunday morning warm up lap in Imola, but instead of returning to the grid, he will return to pit lane for the start

“Car 24 [Zhou] was involved in a collision and suffered significant damage during the Sprint session,” the FIA stewards report read.

“In repairing Car 24 subsequent to the Sprint session, Car 24 was found to have breached Article 40.6 of the FIA Formula 1 Sporting Regulations as the car used during the Sprint session was not covered and ready for FIA seals within 2 hours of the Sprint session. Furthermore, in breach of Article 40.9, the Competitor was found to have continued to work on the car unsupervised while under parc ferme conditions.

“The Competitor admitted that modifications were made to the car. In any event, given the lack of supervision the Stewards would have been entitled to draw an inference that modifications were made to the car and/or changes were made to the set-up of the suspension while the car was to have been held under parc ferme conditions.

“The penalty for breach of the parc ferme conditions is specified in Article 40.9 b), which is for the driver to start from the pitlane. We accordingly imposed the penalty stipulated in Article 40.9 b).”