Jarno Trulli has been handed a 25 second penalty for overtaking behind the final safety car at today's Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne, dropping the Italian down the order and promoting the reigning champ Lewis Hamilton onto the podium.
Trulli had been in third place when the safety car triggered by the crash between Sebastian Vettel and Robert Kubica emerged onto the track, but he ran off the track and dropped behind Hamilton's McLaren. Then, for some bizarre reason, he got the idea that it was within his rights to re-take the position while still behind the pace car. The fact that the race finished as a tight chain of cars means that Trulli's 25-second penalty drops him right down to 12th place, promoting Hamilton up to third place and moving the other drivers up a place.
This is all good news for Toro Rosso, who see Sebastien Buemi move up to 7th place on his debut and Sebastien Bourdais move into the points in 8th.
Meanwhile, in a busy post-race penalty-flinging contest for the race stewards, Sebastian Vettel was handed a 10-place grid penalty for next weekend's Malaysia Grand Prix for (in the stewards' eyes at least) causing the crash with Kubica. The insult to this injury for the Red Bull team was a $50,000 fine, given to them for telling the German driver to carry on behind the safety car despite being down to three wheels.
| Revised Race Result | ||||
| Pos | Driver | Car | Time/Reason | Pts |
| 1 | Jenson Button | Brawn - Mercedes | 1:34:15.784 | 10 |
| 2 | Rubens Barrichello | Brawn - Mercedes | +0.807 | 8 |
| 3 | Lewis Hamilton | McLaren - Mercedes | +2.914 | 6 |
| 4 | Timo Glock | Toyota | +4.435 | 5 |
| 5 | Fernando Alonso | Renault | +4.879 | 4 |
| 6 | Nico Rosberg | Williams - Toyota | +5.722 | 3 |
| 7 | Sebastien Buemi | Toro Rosso - Ferrari | +6.004 | 2 |
| 8 | Sebastien Bourdais | Toro Rosso - Ferrari | +6.298 | 1 |
| 9 | Adrian Sutil | Force India - Mercedes | +6.335 | |
| 10 | Nick Heidfeld | BMW Sauber | +7.085 | |
| 11 | Giancarlo Fisichella | Force India - Mercedes | +7.374 | |
| 12 | Jarno Trulli | Toyota | +26.604 | |
| 13 | Mark Webber | Red Bull - Renault | +1 Lap | |
| 14 | Sebastian Vettel | Red Bull - Renault | +2 Laps | |
| 15 | Robert Kubica | BMW Sauber | +3 Laps | |
| 16 | Kimi Raikkonen | Ferrari | +3 Laps | |
| R | Felipe Massa | Ferrari | Techy gremlin | |
| R | Nelson Piquet Jr | Renault | Utterly useless | |
| R | Kazuki Nakajima | Williams - Toyota | Big crash | |
| R | Heikki Kovalainen | McLaren - Mercedes | Turn 1 dunce |
Drivers Championship -
1 Button 10pts, 2 Barrichello 8pts, 3 Hamilton 6pts, 4 Glock 5pts, 5 Alonso 4pts, 6 Rosberg 3pts, 7 Buemi 2pts, 8 Bourdais 1pt.
Constructors Championship -
1 Brawn - Mercedes 18pts, 2 McLaren - Mercedes 6pts, 3 Toyota 5pts, 4 Renault 4pts, 5 Williams - Toyota, Toro Rosso - Ferrari 3pts.
| < Prev | Next > |
|---|
