SERGIO PEREZ ON THIN ICE AS RED BULL STAR AT RISK OF BEING BANNED FROM F1 RACE

is the driver most at risk of accumulating 12 penalty points and picking up a one-race suspension, with the star already on eight total points over the last 12 months. star is also on the same tally.

Perez has enjoyed an impressive start to the 2024 campaign, scoring four podiums in the first five races to ensure that he heads into the Miami Grand Prix within a race win's reach of team-mate and reigning world champion Max Verstappen.

So far, no F1 driver has accumulated enough penalty points in a 12-month period to pick up the race ban, but after a drama-filled Chinese Grand Prix in which 11 points were dished out, some drivers are now edging closer to that embarrassing fate.

While Perez and Sargeant have locked out the top two positions, Lance Stroll is a new arrival in the top three. The Canadian racer picked up a ten-second time penalty for colliding with Daniel Ricciardo under the safety car in Shanghai, bringing his season tally to seven.

Despite Ricciardo's extreme criticism of Stroll's lack of concentration after the race, the Aston Martin driver was unconvinced that he was to blame for the crash, instead pointing the finger at drivers further forward for causing a concertina effect at the turn six hairpin.

"I got a penalty because of the end result that I hit Ricciardo, but it's not like everything was normal and I just slammed into the back of him," he said after the Chinese GP. "There was a really odd concertina effect that I would have liked to see the stewards take into consideration maybe a little bit more.

"Someone braked at the front of the pack and then everyone stops. The car in front of me just stopped from like 60 to zero. It was one of those stupid incidents. I was in his gearbox and ready for the restart, and just very unlucky. We were having a good race so then so it's a shame."

The only other driver with 50 per cent or more of the 12 penalty points required for a ban is Stroll's Aston Martin team-mate. Fernando Alonso started the campaign with a clean slate, but his involvement in George Russell's crash in Melbourne, and his contact with Carlos Sainz in the Shanghai sprint race have earned him six points.

Seven drivers have a totally clean slate after the first five races, including both Ferrari, McLaren and Alpine drivers. The other outlier is Alex Albon, whose start to the 2024 campaign has been in stark contrast to that of team-mate Sargeant.

2024-04-24T07:42:43Z dg43tfdfdgfd