Raikkonen escapes penalty for Safety Car speeding

2013 Monaco Grand Prix

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Kimi Raikkonen has escaped a penalty for driving too quickly while the Safety Car was on the track.

Raikkonen was found to have lapped two seconds below the minimum time set by the FIA ECU during the first safety car period.

The stewards chose to give Raikkonen a reprimand for the infringement. He went to finish tenth in the race.

2013 Monaco Grand Prix

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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26 comments on “Raikkonen escapes penalty for Safety Car speeding”

  1. Those last 2 laps from him were quite amazing, 23 points finish streak now, could’ve been much better though. Starting to be frustrated by Perez to be honest… first in China, now in Monaco, it’s like Perez thinks he is in a GP2 race when the adults are trying to get reasonable results by driving with their brains..

    1. Puh-lease.

    2. Could not agree more. If you want a real blow by blow of how Perez kept upping the anti, until he got to a point when he was just basically hoping to barge his way through at that corner, watch Ant Davidson’s analysis on the Sky Pad widget..

      Loved Alonso´s reference to Perez, and Kimi being the most unlucky victim of that madness, in a tweet just after the race.

    3. Isn’t it the longest point finish streak ever? Also race finish streak (34/35)? Well, if Perez isn’t getting anything for his actions, it’d be very wrong that Raikkonen would get given that Raikkonen lost 9 pts (atleast) thanks to the maniac.

      1. Not yet he’s on 23 races in the points in a row, one behind Michael Schumacher who got 24 in the early 00’s. Mind when Michael did it the points went down to 6th only for the majority of the races.

        1. yeah but he did it with the best car on the grid

          1. @todfod And Raikkonen isn’t in one of the top 4 cars and only has to finish in the top 10? Credit where credit is due.

    4. Oh wait, so we’re slating drivers for making daring lunges to overtake people now? He went for a gap, but I’d say Kimi closed the door on him, which will only ever end in tears for at least one driver.

      1. No we´re slating ONE particular driver for almost taking out three World Champions with questionable overtaking attempts. Each getting progressively more ridiculous, until he actually tried to pass a car that he didn’t even have his front wheels alongside the back wheels of, where the door was already clearly closed, and even if he had been able to barge through he would have taken both cars out anyway….

        Incidentally I counted 8 World Champions (so far) who all said individually today that Perez was driving like a lunatic. Those same World Champions also gave him credit for his pass on Button – Button being one of them.

        1. Agreed.
          His overtake on Button was superb. Full marks for him on that.
          His overtake on Alonso was rude, but just about passable.
          His overtake on Raikkonen was stupid; going for a gap that was not logically there.

          There’s a difference between confidence and cockiness. Perez doesn’t know this difference.

  2. Traverse (@)
    26th May 2013, 18:37

    It’s unfair that Kimi escapes real punishment for clearly breaking the safety car protocol, yet Hamilton adhered to the delta time and as a result lost two places. Maybe next time Hamilton should race back to the pits…or maybe this sort of leniency is only afforded to the “Ice Man”.

    1. Hamilton lost two places because he backed off and didn’t follow Rosberg closely into the pits.

    2. It’s unfair that Hamilton decided to ease off? He could have been much closer to the delta time than what he was. He only has himself to blame for losing those two places.

    3. @hellotraverse

      Reprimand is a real punishment, if you get three of them you’ll receive a grid penalty. What do you propose then that would’ve been more worthy for the action of lapping two seconds below the delta time?

      Also, Red Bulls adhered to the delta time as well so what makes you think they got advantage of any kind which wouldn’t have been there for Hamilton to get also?

    4. Traverse (@)
      26th May 2013, 19:23

      @tmekt @debaser91 @jamesf1
      My point is if the standard “punishment” for exceeding the safety car delta time was a reprimand, maybe Hamilton wouldn’t have been overly cautious. Fear of receiving a penalty was likely the motive for his cautious approach, Kimi on the other hand stuck two fingers up to FIA rules and got away with it.

      1. Rubbish. It would have been a reprimand for Lewis if he had done the same.

      2. @hellotraverse

        No, he didn’t get away with it, he got a reprimand which, as I said, is a real penalty and quite justified given the “magnitude” of the offense.

        1. Traverse (@)
          26th May 2013, 20:30

          @tmekt
          A reprimand is not a penalty, it’s a warning that you’ll receive a real penalty should you break the rules repeatedly.

          1. @hellotraverse

            How do you define a penalty then? Räikkönen breached the rules and FIA as the authority took a disclipinary action and formally imposed a reprimand. Just because it’s milder than a grid penalty, time penalty or a drive-through for example doesn’t make it any less of a penalty in the definition of the word.

            It’s the only justified punishment that I can think of given what the breach was. I don’t know what the delta time was in this case but 2 seconds doesn’t make the slightest bit of difference in terms of safety or driver benefiting from the gain in time in comparison to others (at least not this time).

    5. Well, if you get 3 reprimands its an automatic grid drop, so its hardly as if a reprimand is getting away with it. IMO this is a lot better than changing the race results.

    6. He didn’t slow down to meet the delta time though. He slowed down to give his mechanics an easier double pit stop. Which in hindsight was a mistake.

      Remember that he was pitting so his lap time was already going to be slow and would easily clear the safety car delta lap time.

  3. A reprimad? So every time someone else speeds under the safety car, would they just be given a reprimand too? Raikonen should have been given a 10 sec penalty imo. This is why there should be permanent race stewards. Without them, penalties can be biased in favour of certain drivers.
    Think about it this way. “If it was RoGro who had done it, he surely would have been penalized”.
    Some of you can defend Raikonen saying he is an awesome driver and that this is a rare incident. But penalties should be consistent and based on what happened and not on will it happen again.

    1. So you don’t think repeat offenders should be penalized harder?

      One of the most ridiculous statements I’ve heard today and I’ve heard some pretty ridiculous statements today.

  4. At the beginning of the race , VET and HAM got to the chicane, Seb got a much better exit and Lewis moved to the left, blocked him and then moved back to the right and there was still plenty of distance until Tabac, I’m not sure it was totally legal, any opinions ?

    1. You are allowed to move off the racing line to defend once, then you’re allowed to move back into the racing line providing the other car isnt alongside you, which Vettel wasnt.

    2. Seemed alright. If you don’t force a car off the track or into the barriers it’s fine, basically.

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