Ted Kravitz says Racing Bulls were ‘warned’ by the FIA about clutch issue on Liam Lawson’s F1 car

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Liam Lawson had a troublesome Friday at the Canadian Grand Prix, completing only five laps of the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve across FP1 and Sprint qualifying.

In fact, the Racing Bulls driver was unable to take part in Sprint qualifying entirely, due to a hydraulics issue that ruled him out of the shootout ahead of Saturday’s shorter format race.

The issue cropped up in FP1, with Lawson being forced out of his VCARB03 after completing just a handful of rotations around the Montreal-based circuit.

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To make matters worse for the Faenza-based outfit, they were reportedly fined following his retirement from the first and only practice session of the weekend for a fault in Lawson’s clutch disengagement system (CDS).

His F1 car was left stranded as marshals were unable to move the car out of harm’s way. The technical regulations stipulate that ‘all cars must be fitted with a means of disengaging the clutch for a minimum of 15 minutes’ in the event that they are forced to stop.

• READ MORE: George Russell takes Canada Sprint pole ahead of Kimi Antonelli and Lando Norris

Racing Bulls were previously warned by the FIA about clutch issue

During Sky Sports F1’s coverage of Sprint qualifying at the Canadian Grand Prix, Ted Kravitz revealed the extent of the fine that Racing Bulls received for the issue that hindered the trackside marshals’ attempts to recover the stricken car.

“If Liam Lawson’s day couldn’t get any worse, his team have now been fined €10,000 (£8,600),” Kravitz said. “They were actually fined €30,000 (£25,900), but €20,000 (£17,300) of that has been suspended.”

The reason for such a hefty fine, according to Kravitz, is due to the fact that Racing Bulls had been warned about the issue before by the sport’s governing body.

“The marshals couldn’t get his abandoned car in FP1 into neutral, so they couldn’t move it away,” he continued. “The stewards said Racing Bulls had been warned that the design of their system might mean that this kind of thing could happen, hence the fine.” 

Lawson will now start Saturday’s Sprint race from the back row of the grid, while rookie teammate Arvid Lindblad managed to flex his muscles by squeezing his VCARB03 into SQ3. The 18-year-old will line up in P9 Sprint.

While the issue is, naturally, very frustrating for the New Zealander, he can take some confidence in the pace that Lindblad showcased during his flying laps. He will have a shot at redemption during qualifying for the Grand Prix on Saturday afternoon.

• READ MORE: David Coulthard saw Liam Lawson ‘fighting for his career’ in Max Verstappen incident at Miami GP

Ted Kravitz also highlighted the FIA’s ‘hilarious’ administrative error with Racing Bulls’ fine

Continuing in his update on the situation within Racing Bulls’ garage, Sky F1’s pit lane reporter drew attention to an administrative error from the FIA when handing out the fine.

He said, “They might end up actually having to revoke the document because of a little administrative error from the FIA. They just used a template, and they haven’t actually named Racing Bulls as the team that gets the fine. They put it as the FIA F1 team gets the fine. 

“So, a good lawyer could say, ‘Well, we don’t have to pay the fine because we’re not the FIA F1 team. We are the Visa CashApp Racing Bulls. That’s not what you said in the document.’ I’m sure that they will withdraw the document and then reissue it with the correct team.”

F1 commentator David Croft couldn’t help but laugh at the mistake, adding, “Very hilarious.”