Romain Grosjean has narrowly escaped disqulification from qualifying after his Lotus failed scrutineering on Saturday evening.
In particular, his E21 failed the front-floor deflection test which would usually see a driver penalised for infringing the technical regulations.
A statement issued by the stewards read: “Car number 08 did not comply with Article 3.17.5 of the 2013 FIA Formula One Technical Regulations as the front floor deflected more than 5mm vertically when the load was applied vertically to it at the point which lies 100mm [from the] car centre line on the RHS.”
However the Lotus team argued that his car was damaged after a heavy impact with a kerb which broke the splitter support-column.
The stewards, after inspecting Kimi Raikkonen’s car – which passed the test – accepted the explanation and deemed it to be a case of “accidental damage, not a case of non-compliance,” and have therefore chosen not to penalise Grosjean.
The Frenchman will retain his third place grid position behind Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel for the Hungarian Grand Prix.
