Magnussen is tenth F1 driver to be banned over a driving infringement · RaceFans
At Singapore next week Kevin Magnussen will become the 10th driver in the history of the world championship to be banned from a round due to a driving infringement or infringements.
He is the first driver to be banned by accumulating penalty points for multiple infringements. All of those before him were suspended because of incidents which happened at a single event, and not always at an F1 race.
Jean-Pierre Beltoise, 1971
Jean-Pierre Beltoise was given two separate bans from a total of four Formula 1 races in 1971 for his role in a terrible crash which claimed the life of Ignazio Giunti during the 1,000 kilometres of Buenos Aires sportscar race. When his Matra ran out of fuel at the final corner Beltoise began pushing his car the short distance to the pits, in contravention of the rules. Giunti, unsighted behind Ferrari team mate Mike Parkes, slammed into Beltoise’ car, sustaining fatal injuries.
Following the crash in January, Beltoise was banned from the season-opening F1 race at Kyalami in South Africa in March. He returned for the next five races, until the FIA chose to impose a further ban, ruling him out of the German, Austrian and Italian rounds in August and September. He returned for the final two rounds of the season.
The following year Beltoise scored the only victory of his career, and the last for BRM, in soaking wet conditions at Monaco. He retired from F1 after two more years with the team.
Christian Danner, 1987
Zakspeed driver Christian Danner was blamed, and banned, for a huge crash involving Ferrari’s Michele Alboreto during qualifying for the Monaco Grand Prix in 1987. Danner was climbing towards Massenet after leaving the pits as Alboerto, on a flying lap, tried to pass on his left. The pair made contact and Alboreto was launched into the barriers.
Fortunately the Ferrari driver was not only unhurt but well enough to return to the track in his spare car. Danner, however, was thrown out of the event, a reaction even Alboreto felt was excessive.
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Nigel Mansell, 1989
Nigel Mansell earned himself a ban following a Portuguese Grand Prix so controversial a repeat today would undoubtedly cause a social media meltdown.
The Ferrari driver was shown the black flag for engaging reverse gear in the pits when he overshot his box. Mansell insisted he did not see the flag disqualifying him from the race as he hunted down Ayrton Senna in pursuit of victory.
Though Senna was locked in a championship fight with team mate Alain Prost he remained as uncompromising as ever with his rivals, and when Mansell made a bid for the inside at turn one the McLaren swung in. Contact was made and both retired.
The FIA threw the book at Mansell for colliding with a rival when he shouldn’t even have been on the track any more, banning him from the next race in Spain.
Eddie Irvine, 1994
Eddie Irvine also did not endear himself to Senna when he un-lapped himself from the McLaren driver during his debut in the 1993 Japanese Grand Prix. Jordan kept Irvine on board for the following season, but he landed himself in hot water again when he was involved in a four-car crash.
Martin Brundle had just lapped Eric Bernard when his car faltered with a technical problem. Bernard backed off as Irvine bore down on him. Meanwhile, Jos Verstappen was pulling out from behind Irvine to pass him.
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Irvine ducked left to avoid Bernard, tangled with Verstappen and the pair skittled into Bernard and Brundle. The latter suffered a whack on his crash helmet from Verstappen’s right-rear wheel.
All four survived, though Brundle sustained a concussion. Irvine was held responsible for the collision, a view challenged by many who saw it as a product of unfortunate circumstances. But if his one-race ban seemed harsh to some, the FIA’s decision to triple it when Jordan appealed against the decision was shocking. Having only started three F1 races thus far, Irvine was forced to sit the next three out.
Mika Hakkinen, 1994
The 1994 German Grand Prix began with one of the most destructive first laps F1 has ever seen. Of the 26 starters, 11 failed to make it as far as lap two, largely due to a pair of multi-car crashes.
The second of those, at the first corner, was triggered by Mika Hakkinen. Hard to the inside with three drivers to his left, Hakkinen squeezed too close to David Coulthard and the pair made contact. Coulthard avoided being taken out, but five others weren’t so lucky.
Given what had happened to Irvine, McLaren wisely accepted Hakkinen’s one-race ban without risking an extension.
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Michael Schumacher, 1994
The third driver to collect a ban during the 1994 season was also the one who won the championship – and it wouldn’t have been anything like as close if he hadn’t been told to miss two rounds.
Michael Schumacher’s ban resulted partly from his own misdemeanour and his team’s poor response to it, and also some sloppy work on the authorities’ part. It began when he repeatedly overtook pole-winning championship rival Damon Hill prior to the start of the British Grand Prix. Schumacher did so on both formation laps, as the initial start was abandoned.
Amid confusion over exactly what penalty had been applied to Schumacher, including his team making the questionable assumption that he was being given a post-race penalty, the Benetton driver was shown the black flag. Like Mansell five years earlier, Schumacher continued, though he pitted and served a 10-second stop-and-go penalty.
Afterwards the FIA World Motor Sport Council took a dim view of how both Benetton and the British Grand Prix stewards handled the matter. Both were sanctioned – in Schumacher’s case, along with disqualification from the race, he was handed a two-race ban.
Jacques Villeneuve, 1997
Another case of a champion who was banned from a race, though in Jacques Villeneuve’s case it was temporarily suspended, allowing him to race, though it was later upheld and the ban stood.
Villeneuve collected his ban during practice for the penultimate race of the season at Suzuka. In the previous round at the Nurburgring two weeks earlier he had failed to slow down sufficiently in response to yellow flags, his third such infringement of the year. On Saturday in Japan, Villeneuve was one of five drivers who failed to back off as they passed Verstappen’s stranded Tyrrell.
The Williams driver was the only one who was already on his third ‘strike’, and another meant an immediate ban. It was a disaster for his championship chances, handing rival Schumacher a precious opportunity to erase Villeneuve’s nine-point lead.
Williams appealed and Villeneuve was allowed to race in the meantime. His efforts to delay Schumacher failed, however, and when the ban was upheld Villeneuve knew he would head into the finale trailing his rival.
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Yuji Ide, 2006
In the space of just three years, Honda went from having a full works team and spin-off B-team to canning both. The latter, Super Aguri, came into existence in 2006 with an all-Japanese driver line-up.
Alongside the experienced Takuma Sato, Super Aguri hired leading Formula Nippon (now Super Formula) racer Yuji Ide. His unfamiliarity with F1 venues made for a difficult transition, however, and he was involved in a series of incidents over his first three weekends.
Then on the first lap at Imola, Ide attempted a highly optimistic move on Christijan Albers in the Villeneuve right-hander which flipped the Midland into a horrifying barrel-roll. The FIA decided it had seen enough and withdrew his superlicence.
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Romain Grosjean, 2012
Romain Grosjean didn’t endear himself to his rivals during his first full season of F1 in 2012. He tangled with Pastor Maldonado in Australia, Michael Schumacher in Malaysia and Monaco, Sergio Perez in Spain, Paul di Resta in Britain and Felipe Massa in Germany. But how far he was to blame for each of those incidents was a matter of debate – the stewards didn’t penalise him for any of them.
At Spa, however, Grosjean was unquestionably to blame for a monumental crash which took him and four others out of the race. Trying to block Lewis Hamilton as they approached La Source, Grosjean forced the McLaren onto the grass, which pushed his car into Fernando Alonso and the Saubers of Perez and Kamui Kobayashi.
This was clearly a serious incident which deserved a significant penalty. However the stewards made the controversial ruling that Grosjean’s actions were especially worthy of punishment because he had not merely collided with other drivers, but “leading championship contenders”, which they evidently considered more serious.
Grosjean was banned from the next race at Monza. As a result of the incident, in 2014 the FIA introduced a new system under which drivers may be banned if they collect 12 penalty points on their licence.
Kevin Magnussen
Under the new penalty system several drivers came close to reaching the 12 points needed to trigger an automatic ban. Daniil Kvyat reached 10 in 2017, though it became immaterial as he lost his drive soon afterwards.
Last year Pierre Gasly was extremely fortunate to avoid a ban as he was already on 10 penalty points when he caused a collision which took his team mate out of the Australian Grand Prix. The stewards took no action, prompting accusations they did not wish to trigger a ban for a driver by penalising a minor incident.
However last weekend Magnussen became the first driver to collect such a penalty – coincidentally, following a collision with Gasly. He has also been involved in collisions with Alexander Albon, Logan Sargeant and Yuki Tsunoda earlier in the year, all of which added to his penalty points tally. A further incident in Miami, where he repeatedly left the track to prevent Lewis Hamilton overtaking him, contributed to his total of 12.
And not forgetting…
Other drivers have been banned or forced to miss races under circumstances related to their driving in F1 or other series.
In some cases the mere fact they had taken to the track was the issue at stake. Mario Andretti and Bobby Unser were barred from competing in the 1968 Italian Grand Prix because they also participated in a race in the USA the same weekend. Hans Heyer was barred from the 1977 Austrian Grand Prix because he had started the previous race at the Hockenheimring illegally.
In 1978, many drivers blamed Riccardo Patrese for the accident which claimed the life of Ronnie Peterson at the start of the Italian Grand Prix. The authorities did not blame him, but when a group of drivers refused to start the next race at Watkins Glen if he appeared on the grid, Patrese stepped aside, and returned for the final race at Montreal.
Finally in 2002 Sauber rookie Felipe Massa was given a 10-place grid penalty for colliding with Pedro de la Rosa. As the penalty was specifically applied to Massa for the next race at Indianapolis, Sauber realised they could avoid it if they substituted him, so they did: Massa skipped the race as Heinz-Harald Frentzen drove his car.
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