EXCLUSIVE: Coulthard to get 5-Place Grid Penalty in Monaco!
David Coulthard will receive a five-place grid penalty in Monaco after Red Bull Racing was forced to change the gearbox on the Scot’s RB4 following his major accident in second qualifying.
Coulthard's qualifying accident has repercussions for his race. (LAT photo)
David Coulthard will receive a five-place grid penalty in Monaco after Red Bull Racing was forced to change the gearbox on the Scot’s RB4 following his major accident in second qualifying.
Although the news has yet to be confirmed by either the FIA or the team, the Scot informed SPEEDtv.com on Saturday evening! He will now start in 15th place rather than the impressive 10th he had earned before the huge crash.
The team has managed to escape an even worse penalty, because had the chassis not been repairable he would have had to start a fresh car from the pit lane. Technical guru Geoff Willis said that there was “non-structural” damage in the area of the sidepods, which could be fixed by race time. He admitted that in the days of easy access to spare cars, the team would have swapped chassis.
Coulthard admitted that he had a sore head that had become worse since the accident, but he had not sought medical treatment. The team has not yet confirmed whether a mechanical issue caused the accident, although DC is not convinced that it was his fault.
“I was doing around 115mph when the incident happened, and I went into the wall quite hard. When I hit the brakes the car turned, I was going over a rise so it's possible I locked the rear axle, but normally when that happens, you can just release the brake a little bit. We'll check the car and see if anything was going wrong at the rear, as it turned very quickly. It's normal for the rear to go light when you brake there, as we don't have engine braking or anything like that, but you drive with that in mind, so I'm surprised what happened was so violent.”
