Whiting: Max went off the track and rejoined unsafely

The incident between the Red Bull driver and his Ferrari rival is well documented, with the FIA race stewards ruling swiftly: “Car 33 left the track at turn 16 and re-joined unsafely."

But after the race, Verstappen made no bones about his feelings, "I don't know why I got a penalty. It is a bit stupid."

FIA race stewards investigated the incident during the early stages of the race and quickly ruled that "car 33 left the track at turn 16 and re-joined unsafely" while handing out a five seconds penalty for the transgression which the Red Bull driver served during his pitstop.

Speaking to media after the race in Japan, F1 race director Charlie Whiting backed his stewards, "It was quite clearly a penalty because Max went off the track and rejoined the track unsafely."

"You are required to rejoin safely and Kimi was there and he pushed him off the track. So I think that was a fairly straightforward one for the stewards."

Shortly after the Raikkonen clash, Verstappen was clattered into by Sebastian Vettel when the Ferrari driver attacked for third place and came off second best, while Verstappen continued unaffected to finish the race in third.

With regards to the Vettel incident, Whiting said, "Seb tried to get up the inside, and it was a reasonable move. He got halfway alongside and Max turned in... a bit of a classic really.

"Stewards don't normally give penalties unless they are sure that one driver was wholly or predominantly to blame. Opinions will vary on whether there was equal blame but certainly, no driver was predominantly to blame they felt."

During his chat with reporters after the race, Verstappen argued, "I'm not the one who makes the rules otherwise a lot of penalties would have been avoided in F1, but I think it is a similar scenario to what I had in China with [Vettel].

"Of course we didn't spin off the track, but he drove into the side of my car," added the Dutchman who was penalised that day in Shanghai.

But Whiting insisted there were no similarities between the incidents, "In China [Verstappen] came charging down the inside into the hairpin, and almost T-boned Seb, I don't think there was any similarity between the two."

"My recollection from that incident as it was a very clear case of causing a collision, and I think what Sebastian was doing was a genuine attempt to overtake. What Max was doing in China was opportunistic at best," added Whiting.

https://www.grandprix247.com/2018/10/08/whiting-alonso-gained-an-advantage-by-leaving-the-track/