Kevin Magnussen has moved within two penalty points of a race ban following a disastrous weekend at the Miami Grand Prix. The Haas driver picked up six separate time penalties over the course of the sprint race and the feature race and will now be treading on eggshells for the remainder of the campaign.
In F1, drivers can pick up penalty points for a multitude of things, although mostly these are only dished out for avoidable contact or dangerous driving. If a racer accumulates 12 points over a 12-month period, they are issued a one-race suspension. Since these rules were introduced, no driver has breached the threshold, but that may be about to change.
Magnussen entered the Miami GP weekend with just five points to his name, but some controversial tactics in the sprint race led to three separate 10-second time penalties for leaving the track and gaining an advantage. The third of these punishments also came wrapped in three penalty points, taking his tally to eight.
The Danish driver was attempting to keep the faster Lewis Hamilton behind by any means necessary, giving Haas team-mate Nico Hulkenberg the opportunity to open up a gap in P7 and score valuable points for the team. This worked but came at a high cost to Magnussen.
Following a trip to the stewards, Magnussen was brandished with an additional five-second penalty for his repeat offences, leaving his total for the sprint race at an unprecedented 35 seconds. However, this wasn’t where the drama ended.
On lap four of a dramatic Miami GP, Magnussen was attempting to sneak a move at the inside of Logan Sargeant at Turn Three. However, due to the late nature of the Dane’s manoeuvre, his Williams counterpart didn’t leave space and was tagged, sending him spinning into the barriers and out of the race.
For his role in the crash, Magnussen picked up a fourth 10-second time penalty of the weekend, but crucially, he was also handed two penalty points, bringing his 12-month accumulated tally to 10. Worse, still with most of these having been delivered this season, they will not be wiped from his record for a long time.
That wasn’t where the drama ended for Magnussen though. To compound his misery, the 31-year-old was hit with a drive-through penalty, converted into a 20-second post-race penalty, for entering the pit lane under safety car conditions but not making a stop. Thankfully, he wasn’t awarded any penalty points for this incident.
