Breaking: Lewis Hamilton's Hit With Penalty, To Start Azerbaijan Grand Prix From Pitlane

Saajan Jogia | Sep 15, 2024

2024 Bahrain Test, Day 3 - Lewis Hamilton / Jiri Krenek / Mercedes

Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton will start the Azerbaijan Grand Prix from the pit lane as a result of breaching the allowance for power unit components after qualifying at the Baku City Circuit. The British driver had qualified seventh on Saturday.

Hamilton's W15 F1 car will be fitted with a fifth internal combustion engine, along with a fifth MGU-H, MGU-K, and turbocharger. This update was anticipated following the engine failure Hamilton experienced at the Australian Grand Prix. Mercedes opted to introduce these changes in Baku, possibly due to the likelihood of safety cars on the street circuit's tight layout.

Lewis will take a new Power Unit ahead of today’s #AzerbaijanGP. He will therefore start from the pit lane pic.twitter.com/dgTEq9o50n

— Mercedes-AMG PETRONAS F1 Team (@MercedesAMGF1) September 15, 2024

Alpine has chosen the same route as Hamilton's, with Esteban Ocon's A524 F1 car. Ocon has had a challenging weekend, beginning with an MGU-H problem in first practice that limited him to just three installation laps and necessitated a power unit change.

In FP3, he experienced a high-pressure fuel pump failure, which caused him to stop on track and miss the rest of the session while Alpine replaced the components. Consequently, Alpine decided to introduce a new power unit, putting Ocon alongside Hamilton in the pit lane.

Pierre Gasly faced disqualification due to a fuel flow violation, while Zhou Guanyu from Sauber was already set to start from the back of the grid for exceeding his allowed number of power unit components.

Hamilton expressed enthusiasm for his W15 F1 car after the opening practice sessions on Friday. However, following Saturday's qualifying, he admitted that the car did not perform as well as he had hoped. He told the media after the Azerbaijan GP qualifying:

“Every Saturday, it’s the same, so I’m not really surprised.

“FP1 and FP2, the car felt amazing and I was really on it, literally from lap one, [we could] compete down the front.

“Sometimes you wonder when you get to Saturday whether the others were heavier in FP1 and FP2.”

To carry his pace from Friday to Saturday, the seven-time world champion ensured nothing was changed on the W15. However, during qualifying, the tires failed to provide sufficient grip. He added:

“As I said, it felt great yesterday [Friday].

“Then as soon as we started today, I barely changed anything to the car because I didn’t want to mess anything up, and the tires wouldn’t work.

“All day they’ve not worked. The last lap, like the last sector, the tires just started to work, but we missed it.”

Hamilton was confident that the car was capable of being in the top five. He stated:

“I think we have a car that could have been – maybe not the front row, the Ferraris are too strong – at least third or fourth today, but the tires weren’t working."