Kevin Magnussen slammed the FIA Race Stewards at the Formula 1 Italian Grand Prix following a 10-second time penalty and two penalty points on his super license has taken him to a race ban.
Magnussen engaged in a wheel-to-wheel with Alpine’s Pierre Gasly through Turn 4 at Monza during Sunday’s race, with both cars touching and being forced to cut the Variante Della Roggia chicane.
Neither car gained, or lost and advantage, nor was there any damage inflicted upon Magnussen’s Haas or Gasly’s Alpine.
Still, the Stewards deemed the incident was wholly to blame on Magnussen and handed him a 10-second time penalty and two penalty points, meaning he will miss the next Grand Prix in Azerbaijan for reaching the maximum 12 points allowed.
The Dane was seething post-race, baffled by the Stewards’ decision given neither driver’s race was impacted by his manoeuvre.
“I don’t understand it at all,” he told media including Motorsport Week.
“You know, flat out, just completely confused. Me and Gasly raced hard into Turn 4, we had slight contact, we both missed the corner.
“Came back on track again, no damage to either car, no consequence to the race of either of us and I get a 10-second penalty.”
Even the alleged victim in the incident, Gasly, was baffled by the decision, saying “someone told me he got a 10-second penalty. I’m a bit surprised by that. Yeah, he tried, but it was a bit of wheel-to-wheel. In the end, I didn’t lose any time.”
Magnussen referenced an incident between RB’s Daniel Ricciardo and Haas team-mate Nico Hulkenberg, where the Australian squeezed the German onto the grass on Lap 1 on the high-speed approach to Ascari.
Hulkenberg was lucky to escape a major incident and Ricciardo received a five-second penalty, which Magnussen found to be inconsistent with the Stewards’ ruling on his duel with Gasly.
“You know, Lap 1, Ricciardo put Nico in the grass at 300 kilometres an hour, completely destroyed Nico’s race,” Magnussen said.
“Massive consequences and damage to Nico’s car and he gets a five-second penalty. You know, where’s the logic? I just don’t get it.”
With both Haas seats filled for 2025 and Magnussen unlikely to get a drive elsewhere, the Dane has carte blanche and a reset nought value of penalty points for the likely final seven races of his F1 career starting in Singapore.
However, he isn’t just going to go all guns blazing all of a sudden.
Given the fact he was on 10 penalty points since the Miami GP in May, Magnussen will not change his approach from pre-Monza to post-Baku.
“I’m back in Singapore. I have zero points. I said all the time, I’m not going to hold back, you know, it doesn’t make sense. And I scored a point today, so see you later.”
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