Sergio Perez is now just four points away from triggering an automatic F1 race ban following his penalty in the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.
The Red Bull driver was hit with a five-second time penalty for leaving his pit box in an unsafe manner during the early stages of Saturday’s race in Jeddah.
With the majority of the field opting to pit under the early Safety Car, Red Bull double stacked their cars.
But Perez was released directly into the path of Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso, who had to slam on his brakes to avoid hitting the Mexican.
The Saudi Arabian Grand Prix stewards ruled that Alonso had to “take evasive action to avoid a collision” and subsequently penalised Perez
What made the situation worse was the fact that car 11 left the pits when there was a red light shown to it (indicating that it should not go out of the pit box),” they noted.
Although the penalty had no bearing on the result for Perez, who finished second behind Max Verstappen for a second consecutive Red Bull 1-2, it could have consequences further down the line.
That is because Perez was also issued with a penalty point on his licence, taking his total for the current 12-month period up to eight.
