Lando Norris was penalised by the stewards just moments into the Bahrain Grand Prix. It was a significant blow to the Brit who was keen to make up for a disappointing qualifying performance which saw him start down in sixth place.
It looked as though Norris had made a blistering start with a superb launch off the line. By the end of the first lap he had made up three places and was hunting down George Russell in the Mercedes ahead while team-mate Oscar Piastri led from pole position.
But there was soon some doubt over whether his start was illegal. His rival Max Verstappen, who started one place behind in seventh, reported over the radio that the McLaren driver was “over his grid box”.
And, after an investigation, the stewards agreed. On lap eight, it was communicated by the FIA that he had been given a five-second time penalty for his false start.
As Norris had not yet made a pit stop in the race at the time of the announcement of his punishment, he would serve it when he made his mandatory trip to the McLaren garage for a change of tyres.
It was served on lap 11 of the race as the Brit switched to the medium tyres. With more than 40 laps of the Bahrain International Circuit still to go, it was clear that he would be making at least two pit stops as that rubber would not be making it to the end of the race.
The punishment would not have improved the 25-year-old’s mood after a weekend that had not gone his way up to that point. McLaren showed supreme pace in practice and were the obvious contenders for pole position when qualifying began on Saturday.
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Piastri delivered the goods to put a McLaren car on pole for the first time ever in Bahrain. But Norris made a key mistake on his final flying lap and had to settle for sixth on the grid.
And he was clearly furious with himself as he faced the media afterwards. “I’m just not quick enough,” he said. Asked what had gone wrong, he bluntly replied: “Honestly, no idea, just not quick enough. It’s just another day, so I’ll look into things and see why I struggled so much today and try again tomorrow.
“I’ve been slow this whole weekend, to be honest, so it’s nothing too surprising. Honestly, I’ve just been off it. I don’t know, I feel like I’ve just never driven a Formula 1 car before. I’m struggling a lot, I don’t know why and I need to try to find some answers.”
With Norris further hampered by that penalty, the race was very much Piastri’s to lose. When he made his first stop at the end of lap 14, he had been leading the Grand Prix without breaking sweat having taken full control of the race and kept Russell comfortably behind.
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