Kvyat edges closer to race ban with another penalty

Daniil Kvyat will drop three places on tomorrow's grid after the stewards found him guilty of impeding Lance Stroll during the first session of qualifying. As an addition to the three-place grid penalty, he was also handed a penalty point on his Super License, meaning he is only two away from a race ban.

If a driver receives twelve points within a twelve month period, he will be handed a race ban at the next available Grand Prix. Kvyat was limping back to the pits after spinning at Turn 4, but the stewards felt he didn't do enough to get out of the way of  Stroll.

"The stewards examined video, driver radio communications, timing data, telemetry and car positioning data evidence and heard from Daniil Kvyat, the driver of car 26, Lance Stroll, the driver of car 18 and the team representatives," a statement read.

"The stewards determined that Kvyat was on an exceptionally slow lap having spun earlier and damaged his tyres. The stewards acknowledged that he was warned by the team very late of the approach of Stroll who was on a fast lap.

"Further, Kyvat pulled as far to the right as he could as soon as he saw Stroll. However, the stewards considered that these were not mitigating factors. Kyvat was driving exceptionally slowly and taking the racing line at the end of Q1 when other drivers were attempting to set fast laps and this led to the unnecessary impeding."

Kvyat will start the race from sixteenth but revealed that he did not know there was a car behind him: "I hadn't received any call from the team radio. They did not tell me that anybody was coming and I was asked to bring the car in slowly because of the vibrations. The approach speed was so different that when I saw him I went on the grass almost, but for them that was not enough, event that. They like to make an example out of me."

Fergal Walsh