McLaren to appeal Hamilton's penalty
The Vodafone McLaren Mercedes F1 Team have appealed against Lewis Hamilton's penalty at the Belgian Grand Prix. Hamilton received a penalty of 25 seconds which cost him his victory at Spa-Francorchamps.
Hamilton cut the chicane in a fight with Kimi Raikkonen. He dropped back behind Raikkonen to avoid a penalty, but this did not help. The race stewards ruled that Hamilton still gained advantage from cutting the chicane and decided to give him a drive-through penalty after the race, thus a 25-second penalty.
A McLaren spokesperson declared: "We looked at all our data and also made it available to the FIA stewards. It showed that, having lifted, Lewis was 6km/h slower than Kimi as they crossed the start/finish line.
"Having passed the lead back to Kimi, Lewis repositioned his car, moving across and behind Kimi to the right-hand line and then outbraked him into the hairpin. Based on this data, we have no option other than to register our intention to appeal."
