Racing Point has slammed the two reprimands given to Sergio Perez for incidents with Pierre Gasly at the Portuguese Grand Prix.
The Mexican was first punished by the stewards on Saturday after impeding the AlphaTauri driver in qualifying at Portimao on Saturday.
Then, as the two drivers fought late on in the race, Perez was reprimanded again for his defence against Gasly, which was quite reminiscent of Michael Schumacher and Mika Hakkinen at Spa in 2000.
“It was a bit sketchy,” the Frenchman told Sky Sports post-race.
“I don’t know how it looks from the outside, so I need to see the footage, but the difference of speed at that moment is so big, I was probably 30kph faster than him.
“I decided to commit to the inside, and he really moved at the last moment.
“I jumped on the brakes but I did think, ‘OK, we’re both in the gravel.’ I don’t know how we managed to avoid contact.
“I was quite pissed off with him, so the next lap I really sent it round the outside, which was pretty good.”
However, Racing Point boss Otmar Szafnauer believes the reprimand was ridiculous.
“They didn’t touch,” he told RaceFans. “Sergio moved first before Gasly did. Sergio is allowed to make that move in defence.
“You can’t move twice, but you’re allowed to move once. Gasly got out of the throttle and there was no contact. So why the reprimand?
“On lap one Sergio is hit by Verstappen, who comes back onto the track after being off-track, comes back on acutely in order to get his car in a position so he can have grip again and runs into Sergio, and they do nothing.
“Sergio and Gasly didn’t touch. Isn’t that what the fans want? Hard defending, good racing?
“If we start reprimanding drivers and punishing them for racing hard but safely, where is that going to take our sport?”
The other significant point about the reprimands is it now puts Perez just one more away from an automatic 10-place grid drop.
“He’s got two this weekend,” the Racing Point boss continued.
“One of which was in qualifying where he made a mistake in one of the sectors, didn’t realise Gasly was on a fast lap behind him, got out of the way but not quickly enough.
“Well, Gasly got through Q2 into Q3, it didn’t cause him any harm: Reprimand. You saw the other incident: Reprimand.
“Now for the rest of the season, he’s got to drive like a saint. He’s not going to be able to fight hard because there is a risk of a reprimand and then you get a 10 grid place penalty.
“So I think that’s quite harsh. You may not think that reprimand was harsh, but it is.”
