Max Verstappen will be another of the drivers who will receive a penalty on the starting grid of the 2022 Formula 1 Italian Grand Prix for changing elements in his engine, although in the case of the Dutchman it is a five-position penalty, and he should not to start from the back of the pack like many others.
The one from Red Bull will debut an internal combustion engine, so he will accumulate five places with respect to his original starting place that he achieves in the classification on Saturday, and he will have to come back as he did in Spa-Francorchamps to try to add his 11th victory of the season.
In addition, in the week in which the Ferrari team presented a special decoration commemorating 75 years since the birth of the brand with the Giallo Modena on the back, Carlos Sainz received a penalty that sends him 25 positions behind for the race of the Sunday for changing elements in his power unit and replacing the gearbox, which automatically forces him to start from the bottom of the grid.
After studying the risk of penalizing on a track where overtaking is easier than on others like Zandvoort, the Italians decided to mount fresh components on the Spanish car because the next races will be held in places that are not very beneficial for climbing positions, Singapore and Suzuka.
The Ferrari driver will have recently released parts to try the comeback at the home of the tifosi, but he will not be the only one, since Sergio Pérez will have 10 penalty places and Valtteri Bottas 15, while Lewis Hamilton will start from the rear in the Exit at the ‘Temple of Speed’.
In the case of the Briton, he will mount the fourth power unit in his Mercedes, something that the Brackley team doubted, since they were investigating whether the engine they used when the accident with Fernando Alonso occurred at Spa-Francorchamps was still operational .
Thus, the seven-time champion will face the event in which his streak of consecutive grand prix in points was cut short last season after his incident with Max Verstappen in which both finished out of the race from the last places.
For Valtteri Bottas it will be nothing new to start from the rear, since the Alfa Romeo driver is suffering from the poor reliability of the Ferrari 066/7 engine, something that his team manager, Frédéric Vasseur , has come to acknowledge “I think the engine Ferrari has made a step forward, we also did the same job with the chassis, and I think Valtteri [Bottas] and Guanyu [Zhou] are performing.”
“We had some reliability issues, that cost us a lot of points in some races where we were in good form, like Jeddah or Silverstone,” he continued. “It’s a real shame for us and for the championship, but it is how it is.”
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