Jolyon Palmer thinks it makes perfect sense that Lance Stroll was penalized for his part in the incident with Visa Cash App RB driver Daniel Ricciardo just before the restart. According to the former F1 driver, Nico Hülkenberg, who was driving right behind the Aston Martin driver, showed that an accident was relatively easy to avoid.
Stroll caused quite a commotion during the main race in China. Just before the restart, the Canadian misjudged the speed of his predecessor Ricciardo and then crashed straight into the rear of the Australian’s RB car. But even more remarkable was that Stroll blamed Ricciardo. Palmer sheds light on the incident in his analysis for F1TV and concludes that Stroll’s teammate, Fernando Alonso, made almost the same mistake as the Canadian.
“It starts with some confusion between (Carlos, ed.) Sainz and Alonso,” says Palmer. ‘Sainz leaves a small gap to (Sergio, ed.) Pérez’s Red Bull, but I don’t think Sainz is doing anything wrong in this case. He accelerates, slows down again and then closes the gap. I don’t think he’s doing anything out of the ordinary there. However, his action does surprise Alonso’, Palmer sees that Sainz’s actions have consequences for the driver directly behind him.
‘Alonso shifts up towards the corner, but while looking ahead he cannot see what the others are doing in the corner. When you drive a little further into the field, you often look ahead to see whether (in this case) Verstappen is already going for it. You try to anticipate that,” Palmer explains. ‘He (Alonso, ed.) looks four cars ahead instead of the car in front of him and then he almost hits the back of Sainz. There you almost had the crash and the penalty. There he lost control of the situation and got away well.’
Hülkenberg shows how it should be done
While Alonso escaped unscathed, his Aston Martin teammate Stroll, who ended up in a similar situation, was a lot less fortunate. ‘A little further back, his teammate does much the same. He also left a gap to Ricciardo, but in this case I think the fault lies with Lance (Stroll, ed.),” Palmer points out an important difference. ‘He’s looking ahead (at the corner), but he’s not paying attention to the drivers directly in front of him and he’s not prepared for the rest of us to come to a near stop. Behind it, Hülkenberg showed that it was not necessary to crash into the back of your predecessor. He was aware of the situation,” Palmer concludes with a small sneer towards Stroll.
