Williams denies targeting rivals by requesting review of Sirotkin’s Baku penalty

Williams says it was not seeking harsher penalties for rival teams when it requested reviews of five incidents which occurred during the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

The team asked the stewards to reconsider the three-place grid penalty given to Sergey Sirotkin for his collision with Nico Hulkenberg on the first lap of the race.

Chief technical officer Paddy Lowe insisted the team was only interested in improving the situation for its driver rather than disadvantaging its rivals.

“It’s very much around just understanding the penalty [for] Sergey,” said Lowe during the Spanish Grand Prix weekend.

“Whilst we did raise other penalties or non-penalties that was a matter to be considered as reference, not that we wanted any change to anyone else’s situation, that would never be our desire.

“The penalty to Sergey seemed to us particularly harsh in the context of everything else that happened in that event.”

The stewards rejected Williams’ request for a review, stating they had not offered any new evidence which merited reconsidering them.

“We don’t have any ability to appeal but we do have a right to review and we took up that right and the stewards were good enough to put time to it,” said Lowe. “Although they didn’t agree we had new elements they nevertheless gave some opinions back that were helpful. So we leave it at that.”

Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free

2018 F1 season

• Honda’s jet division helped F1 engineers solve power unit problem
• McLaren Racing losses rise after Honda split
• Ricciardo: Baku “s***show” was Red Bull’s fault
• “Drive to Survive Episode 1: All to Play For” reviewed
• F1’s television and social media audiences rose last year