The rear right endplate of Pierre Gasly’s car came off after the accident with his teammate Tsunoda at the start of the race, which saw both drivers go off track.
Gasly retired shortly after with a wing problem, while Tsunoda finished 14th with damage to his car.
Gasly’s endplate subsequently got stuck under race leader Max Verstappen’s RB18 , affecting his handling so much that the Dutchman first thought he had a puncture and pitted. Finally, he could only be seventh.
Red Bull did not discover until after the race that the endplate was stuck to the floor of the car, disrupting airflow, and that it was coming from AlphaTauri. Later, a photo surfaced of a smiling Verstappen holding the piece.
As part of the FIA financial regulations , teams have to account for all the parts they use and therefore the Dutchman was unable to keep it for himself as a souvenir.
Asked by Motorsport.com if Red Bull had given the part back to them, AlphaTauri technical director Jody Egginton said: “Yes, they have. Used Incremental Inventory] and not theirs. So we need it back.”
Egginton acknowledged the unfortunate coincidence that he ended up under a sister team car.
“Sometimes these things snowball, don’t they? Odds are slim, but it did happen, and unfortunately it had an impact on Max’s career. And I’m sorry. Then they gave it back to us.”
Asked what the team planned to do with it, he said: “I don’t know. There are a few places we could put it, but I wouldn’t want to comment on anything…”
Egginton confirmed that, along with Red Bull adviser Helmut Marko and AlphaTauri boss Franz Tost , the team’s engineers had also made it clear to Yuki Tsunoda that the clash with Gasly cannot be repeated.
“There have been talks with Franz and Helmut, which are obviously private,” he said. “And then as a group of engineers we’ve sat down and said what we need to do.”
“But from our side, it’s more about sitting down, discussing it objectively and highlighting what we need, what we want and how we want to get it. So there are a number of different discussions.”
“I’m not aware of the discussions that take place at the team manager level. But at the technical level, as a young driver, we sit down and talk as engineers and say: ‘this is what we have to avoid. And this is what what we want to achieve.”
