FRANCO COLAPINTO REPORTED BY VALTTERI BOTTAS FOR EARLY INCIDENT IN F1 DEBUT RACE

Valtteri Bottas called out Franco Colapinto’s slow driving on the formation lap at the Italian Grand Prix, admitting he did it to get the Williams rookie penalised.

Formula 1’s regulations state that the formation lap must be “kept as tight as possible” but it was anything but at Monza as the front-row starting McLarens were left waiting for the final few drivers to line up.

Valtteri Bottas: That’s the name of the game

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher and Sam Cooper

It was the Stake-Sauber team-mates who made up the very last row of the grid as a disappointing showing in qualifying put them behind Williams rookie Colapinto.

But covering the formation lap ahead of the start, Sky Sports pundit Martin Brundle noted that the back of the grid took a long time to form up which left the front-row starting McLaren’s waiting.

“They’re having to sit on the front of the grid for quite a long time and the problem they had last week in Zandvoort, they didn’t get enough heat into their rear tyres and a long wait on the front row of the grid won’t help that for McLaren,” he said.

“This is taking too long. They really need to talk in the drivers’ briefing about this, there is too long for the back row to line up.”

That wasn’t Bottas or his team-mate Zhou Guanyu’s fault as they were held up by Colapinto, Bottas even complaining to his team over the radio.

“The gap between the car in front and the car in front is very big, according to the rules,” said the Finn, adding that Colapinto was “very slow”.

An otherwise solid F1 debut for Franco Colapinto

PlanetF1.com recommends

👉F1 2024: Head-to-head qualifying record between team-mates

👉F1 2024: Head-to-head race statistics between team-mates

That could’ve been a penalty for the Williams driver on his F1 debut with Bottas honestly admitting that’s why he did it.

“I don’t know why the gap was so big,” he told the media, including PlanetF1.com, after the race. “Obviously it’s his first time, but still I’m sure he will learn from it.

“I just reported it because we might gain a place if he gets a penalty. That’s the name of the game.”

Colapinto went on to finish the Grand Prix in 12th place, two places shy of the points, while Bottas was 16th.

The result meant the Finn, who has yet to score a point this season with his best result back-to-back P13s, dropped to 22nd in the Drivers’ Championship with Colapinto ahead of him in the classification.

Bottas also admitted Sauber need to improve their C44.

“I think here we’ve been in a decent place. Even the balance of the car it actually doesn’t feel too bad. It’s really the overall performance is not there, that’s now the biggest thing we need to improve,” he said.

“Find more downforce and more efficiency, especially in cornering conditions.”

2024-09-05T10:33:15Z dg43tfdfdgfd