F2 Driver Raghunathan Cops a Race Ban for Too Many Penalty Points

Formula 2 driver Mahaveer Raghunathan is in a spot of trouble after collecting his latest penalty. Now, the Indian driver has copped a ban for the next round of the F2 championship in Austria. The 20-year old amassed a grand total of 12 penalty points on his licence within a season. Sadly for him, 12 penalty points automatically results in a one-race ban.

Raghunathan landed himself in this situation after he collected nine penalty points in the feature race at Paul Ricard. According to the stewards, he failed to observe the Virtual Safety Car procedure on all three occasions that it was deployed. The youngster was slapped with three penalty points per infringement.

As for an on-track punishment, 15 seconds were added to him race time and later, a race ban. The ban comes on the back of multiple offences over the course of nine F2 starts this year. The penalty point streak began in Bahrain after he passed the chequered flag twice. Asa result, he was penalised for the following race.

The next infringement was in Baku where he failed to stop at the weigh bridge during practice. Raghunathan got into further trouble when he overtook a rival before the Safety Car line during a restart in the sprint race.

Finally, in Monaco he was penalised for leaving the track and gaining and advantage. A few laps later, he collided with rival driver Jack Aitken. Then, in the sprint race another penalty came his way for driving through the pit lane exit at the start to cut the first corner.

However, Raghunathan was not the only guilty party in Le Castellet. Two other drivers joined him in the stewards’ office after F2 feature race. The first was Sean Gelael, who starts the sprint race from the pit lane for colliding with Prema teammate Mick Schumacher. The other was female driver and Alfa Romeo reserve, Tatiana Calderon, namely a 10-second time penalty for two Virtual Safety Car infringements.