FIA announce MULTIPLE grid penalties ahead of Bahrain Grand Prix

Two Formula 1 drivers have been hit with grid penalties ahead of Sunday's Bahrain Grand Prix, the FIA has announced.

Mercedes duo George Russell and Kimi Antonelli were investigated following Saturday's qualifying session for failing to follow the race director's instructions and leaving the garage before the resumption time had been announced after the session was red-flagged due to a crash in Q2.

Russell went on to qualify P2, with Antonelli qualifying P4, in what was a strong day for the team, but bad news soon followed.

The stewards heard from the team representative, the race director, and FIA Single Seater sporting director, and reviewed video, timing, team radio, and in-car video evidence, although the drivers were excused from attending.

After the review, the stewards handed both drivers a one-place demotion, meaning they will now start Sunday's race P3 and P5.

FIA demote stars at Bahrain Grand Prix

An official statement from the FIA read: "The team representative, Mr Shovlin, in evidence, stated that he gave the instruction for the cars to be released, in error, having misinterpreted the message posted on page three of the Timing Screen, “estimated re-start time” to be a message advising the actual re-start time,"

"He argued that there was no sporting advantage gained in this case as there was sufficient time remaining (11 minutes) for other teams to perform their run plans."

The statement later continued: "The FIA Single Seater Sporting Director stated that such a move could be a sporting advantage in that it could enable a team to perform its run plan whereas other teams may not be able to,"

"The stewards agree with this view particularly where there are only a few minutes remaining in the session. The FIA sporting director argued that there needed to be a sporting penalty rather than a team fine, otherwise in future teams would release their cars as soon as the estimated re-start time was published. The stewards agree with this view.

"Mr Shovlin argued that it was possible to give a non-sporting penalty if the stewards declared that it was not to be taken as a precedent but also stated that if a sporting penalty was to be given, it should be mitigated. The stewards agreed with the view that this breach required a sporting penalty, however, accept that the breach was unintentional and a genuine mistake by the team for which Mr Shovlin apologized."

Clearly, the stewards' decision took into account mitigating circumstances, with the document warning that more severe penalties are likely to be handed out for such incidents in the future.

READ MORE: F1 Qualifying Results: Lando Norris suffers nightmare in Bahrain as championship rival secures stunning pole

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