It seemed irrelevant after Alonso’s engine blew up, but why wasn’t he punished for cutting the corner at the first chicane? James kept referring to Michael at Hungary, but that was a different story: Michael was in front and being overtaken, and was possibly pushed wide by De la Rosa’s move. Alonso was trying to overtake, and went wide due to his own mistake of braking too late. You can clearly see from the on-board footage that they are side-by-side when they reach the braking zone – surely Alonso had to yield the place back?

Also, his relegation to 10th place was not cancelled out by the engine blow-up but may in fact have caused it since Alonso had to push very hard with his engine to get back the places. Interestingly, this was the first Renault engine blow-up since 2003.