Lawson reaches five penalty points after causing two collisions in Bahrain GP

Liam Lawson collected penalty points for collisions with two of his rivals during the Bahrain Grand Prix.

The Racing Bulls driver picked up his first penalty for making slight contact with Lance Stroll’s Aston Martin at turn two.

The stewards noted that “car 30 [Lawson] overtook car 18 [Stroll] in turn one, however lost momentum by missing the apex, then car 18, having taken a better exit, was in front at the entry to turn two and was entitled to racing room at that corner.

“However car 30 collided with the rear axle of car 18, causing a collision and forcing car 18 to compromise the exit of the corner.”

The stewards took into consideration how slight the impact was. “As there was only minor contact this was considered in mitigation and hence a five-second penalty was imposed.”

But they ruled a stiffer, 10-second time penalty was deserved for Lawson’s later tangle with Nico Hulkenberg at turn one.

“At the approach to turn one, car 30 attempted to overtake car 27 [Hulkenberg] on the inside,” they explained. “However [it] missed the apex of the corner, hence was unable to take a normal racing line and consequently collided with the side of car 27.”

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The stewards gave Lawson one penalty point for the Stroll incident and two for the one with Hulkenberg, putting him on a total of five for the current 12-month period.

Lawson said neither of the incidents was deliberate. “We had good speed but just couldn’t really use it and the only way I could overtake was lunging quite late,” he said. “I wasn’t intentionally touching others, but obviously the stewards made their decision with the penalties, so we’ll have to review the incidents.”