Hitech’s FIA Formula 3 driver Martinius Stenshorne has been banned from contesting the Silverstone round of this year’s championship after competing at the circuit last month in the national GB3 series.
Stenshorne participated in the GB3 test at the British circuit on April 25 and 26, as well as contesting a round of the series at the Silverstone venue during the weekend following the test with Chris Dittmann Racing.
The Norwegian’s F3 employers Hitech, although present at the round with their own entrants, were not aware Stenshorne planned to take part and nor were the FIA.
As a result, the governing body released a lengthy statement explaining that Stenshorne was in breach of item 10.4 of the Formula 3 Sporting Regulations, whereby “No driver entered in the Championship may carry out any type of activity on any track with any type of single-seater car that was designed and/or built to achieve a power-to-weight ratio less than 2.0 kg/bhp.”
In addition, article ‘e’ of the regulation states: “Genuine participation to a Standalone event needs to be explicitly approved by the FIA and Promoter in writing.”
A hearing by the stewards gathered Stenshorne plus Hitec, FIA and F3 promoter representatives to come to a verdict.
It was found that all parties other than Stenshorne and his management team were aware of his GB3 participation, thus he had failed to appropriately notify the FIA of his intention to compete in the series.
“Having considered the matter extensively, the Stewards determined that the Driver and the Competitor failed to inform the FIA and the Promoter about the single-seater testing as requested by Article 10.4,” read a verdict on Stenshorne’s Silverstone ban.
“They also failed to request written authorization for the driver to take part in a Standalone Event in GB3, as requested in Article 10.4 e) of the Sporting Regulations.
“The Stewards also noted that both FIA and Promoter representative admitted that if they had received a request for Car 15 to be part of the Standalone race in Silverstone, they would have denied the authorization due to the similarities between the GB3 car and the F3 car and the sporting advantage gain for the driver.
“Therefore, the Stewards determined that this is a serious breach of the testing regulations with a sporting advantage gain for the driver of Car 15 and decided to Suspend the driver of Car 15 for the 2024 FIA Formula 3 Silverstone Event.
“In addition, 4 penalty points are to be added to the driver’s record.”
The news of Stenshorne’s Silverstone ban comes hot off the heels of McLaren announcing the young Norwegian has joined its Formula 1 Driver Development Programme.
Now, Stenshorne has an unnecessary and easily avoidable blot on his copybook.
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