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Max Verstappen won his second race of the season and escaped a penalty for grid slot infringement late on at the 2023 F1 Australian GP at the Albert Park Circuit in Melbourne.
The reigning two-time world champion appeared to be outside his box at the final restart of the race whilst defending from rival and Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton. F1 fans were quick to point out that a portion of Verstappen's RB19 was outside the box.
However, as per the regulations, he wasn't awarded a penalty for infringements like Fernando Alonso in Jeddah and Esteban Ocon in Bahrain. According to Article 54.3b - a driver can position his car in such a way that the transponder is unable to correctly detect the moment a car is outside the grid box.
Also, it appears that the front tires of Verstappen's RB19 are just touching the front lines of the box, which might indicate that his car is still inside the box.
Ahead of the race on Sunday, the FIA made some changes to the positioning of the grid slot to make it for the drivers to see the box. However, speaking to the media, Fernando Alonso was not convinced that the change would make that much of an impact, saying:
"The center line, I don’t think so. Because as I said it's so that’s the biggest difficulty. But the 20 centimeters will help, I guess. You approach the box looking sideways – you’re not looking forwards."
"Also, I think the FIA doesn’t want to have any problem with that, because there is not performance advantage as long as you don’t go too forward. So hopefully we avoid anything from now on.”
Max Verstappen wins a chaotic Australian GP to extend his championship lead over Sergio Perez
Max Verstappen won his maiden Australian GP in Melbourne on Sunday after chaos occurred in the final laps of the race due to the red flag caused by Kevin Magnussen.
The Dutch driver extended his championship lead over his Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez, who finished fifth after starting from the pitlane, to 17 points after three races.
Max Verstappen was joined on the podium by Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso, finishing in P2 and P3 respectively.
