Pastor Maldonado is probably kicking himself at the moment.
After a decent qualifying round in Monaco on Saturday, where he placed the Williams car in 9th best time, the Venezuelan driver could only watch as he was dropped ten places for cutting across the front of Sergio Perez during practice on Friday. The shunt meant that Perez likely damaged his steering and subsequently, during qualifying, experienced the rotten fortune, of crashing in Monaco for the second consecutive year.
The damage meant that did not progress from Q1, as the left front wheel turned the wrong way after Perez hit the barrier.
As for Maldonado, he didn´t capitalize at all from the accident. He was penalised ten places to start 19th, but the Williams team discovered that there had been too much damage to the car, to the extend that the gearbox needed a change. And that drops Maldonado to 24th.
“The car had a lot of damage in it, to the point where we are having to change the gearbox in it as well,” said the Williams team.
“There was a significant amount of damage to the car, so the guys did a really good job to even get it out for qualifying.”
Read more about the ten place penalty here.
