What exactly was going on with Alonso's time penalty?

The stewards gave Fernando Alonso a 10-second time penalty after the Saudi Arabia Grand Prix, only to revoke it. This time penalty determined whether or not Alonso was allowed to keep his 100th podium. In this article, we list the full events and explain what the stewards' reasoning was.

The whole situation began at the start. Alonso was too far to the left at the starting grid, for which he was given a five-second time penalty. Alonso redeemed this penalty while the safety car was on the track, and managed to avoid losing a position. But towards the end of the race, Mercedes suddenly told George Russell via radio that Alonso might still get the five-second time penalty. Confusion ensued, as the race stewards had not made anything public at that point. Alonso received the same message from his team, where the Spaniard managed to put just enough distance between himself and Russell to maintain a five-second gap.

There was already speculation as to why Alonso would get his penalty. Had the team not tracked the time properly? Or was it because the time penalty was not allowed to be redeemed during the safety car? Well, after the podium ceremony, it became clear what the real reason was: the stewards judged that the team had worked on the car while the time penalty was being served, so Alonso received another 10-second penalty which meant he still lost his podium spot. The key player in the stewards' assessment was the person with the jack. According to the stewards, he touched the car with the jack, which they said broke the rules.

Aston Martin files objection

The basis for this is that there is an agreement that the car should not be touched while stationary to serve a time penalty. Any kind of touching counts as 'doing work on the car', according to the stewards, an interpretation they say is supported by all teams.

Aston Martin did not leave it at that and immediately lodged an objection. The FIA document states that Aston Martin managed to cite no less than seven other situations in which the person with the jack touched the car without any consequences. Based on this, the stewards could not help but judge that this interpretation was apparently not as unanimously accepted as initially thought. This assessment, combined with the video material presented by Aston Martin, led the stewards to withdraw the penalty again. Three hours after the race, Alonso was told that his 100th podium had been achieved after all.