Franco Colapinto locked up at Turn 1 in Baku on Saturday, hit Alpine team-mate Pierre Gasly, and put Lando Norris’s McLaren into the wall. Both had to retire. The FIA handed the Argentine a 10-second penalty, converted to a five-place grid drop for the next round at Sepang because he had already retired.

His FIA superlicence did not pick up a single penalty point.

Stewards have quietly stopped punishing collisions

That is the blindspot The Race set out on Sunday, arguing the penalty points system has swung too far the other way after years of driver complaints that it was too harsh. Through 15 rounds of the 2026 season, no driver has been given a penalty point for causing a collision, per the site’s count. Every point handed out this year has been for yellow-flag or safety-car breaches.

The stewards’ own verdict on Colapinto was direct. They wrote that he “braked too late and entered the corner on the inside at a speed which did not allow him to make the corner in a controlled manner” and that he was “wholly or predominantly to blame for the collision”.

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A driver ruled predominantly at fault for wiping out two cars, and no points added to his licence, is the mismatch The Race says is corroding the framework.

Norris wanted a race ban

Norris was collected in the incident with 15 laps to go on the safety-car restart and was blunt afterwards.

“At the end of the day, I just got taken out. Just some drivers that shouldn’t be in Formula 1, to be honest,” he said.

“I’ve not seen it, but if you cause a crash in a restart like this, you should have at least a one-race ban.”

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George Russell was softer, telling reporters, according to The Race, that it was “a small error that had a big consequence” and that a race ban would be “too harsh”.

Briatore may go further than the FIA

McLaren team principal Andrea Stella suggested on Sunday that the internal Alpine reaction could bite harder than anything the stewards did. Alpine executive advisor Flavio Briatore, he said, was capable of a heavier response.

“I’m not sure which one is going to be harsher for whoever caused the problem,” Stella said.

Briatore called the move “a very poor move for a driver of his experience” and said he would “reflect on what course of action should be taken” before deciding. Alpine also condemned the online abuse aimed at Colapinto since the crash.

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Colapinto will start the Malaysian Grand Prix at Sepang from five places lower than he qualifies, and with the same penalty points total on his licence as he had before Baku.

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