Sainz not happy with F1 penalties: 'Perez almost took out two drivers'

It was discussed at the press conference that sometimes it is very unclear what is and is not penalised. Carlos Sainz shares that view. "I struggle to understand it sometimes too, and I'm going to put a very clear example that I even shared with Checo at the time. At the start, Checo completely lost control of the car, and nearly took two guys out, and we were just lucky to, in a way, avoid him, and he went off the track at the start, and there wasn't a consequence, so there was no contact or anything, but it cost a lot of my race and others. However, he did not get a penalty," the Ferrari driver said in Imola.

The Spaniard himself received another time penalty following an incident with Oscar Piastri. "I unfortunately damaged his front wing. He obviously went backwards 15 positions, and I got a five-second penalty, and in that sense, I know that we keep thinking we don't look at the outcome of the penalty. In this case, I think, clearly, we're still looking at the outcome, because I am completely certain that if the front wing of Oscar hadn't had damage, I wouldn't have got a penalty, and everyone would be talking about a good overtake and some good action on a track where it proved to be extremely difficult to overtake and you had to go for a move like that."

So what do penalties depend on at the moment? According to Sainz, penalties are now mainly based on the consequences of a particular action. If there is no contact, no penalty follows. If the consequences for a competitor are big, you get a time penalty. "I'm still a bit puzzled about and I struggle with sometimes," he said.

Kevin Magnussen

Kevin Magnussen, too, does have an opinion about the way penalties are sometimes given out in the top class of motorsport. "I've raced in IndyCar and I love the way they race over there, and I feel the rules are very clear and very simple, and the racing is great. The racing has to be great amongst the 20 best drivers in the world. One thing is that the Formula 1 drivers are fast but also very good at racing, and I think you have to showcase that."

"We all came from karting and learned to race each other. I feel now, certainly for myself with the guidelines this year, some of that is going against the natural racing dynamic that we've all learned from young kids."