UNI-Virtuosi Racing’s Luca Ghiotto has been disqualified from FIA Formula 2 (F2) Championship’s feature race in Monaco as the stewards explain post-red flag drama.

Ghiotto finished second to ART Grand Prix’s Nyck de Vries in Monaco’s feature F2 race on Friday with Carlin’s Nobuharu Matsushita snatching third from DAMS’ Sergio Sette Camara. But with Ghiotto’s disqualification, Matsushita is second and Camara third.

The Italian’s penalty comes as it was found in the parc ferme checks that Ghiotto was ‘using rack stops of a thickness that did not comply with Article 2 of the 2019 FIA Formula 2 Championship Technical Regulations and Page 75 of the Dallara User Manual’.

Ghiotto has been permitted to start Saturday’s sprint race but from the last position. The Italian’s disqualification means also changes the reverse-grid pole-sitter with BWT Arden’s Anthoine Hubert now finishing eighth to start from pole on Saturday.

In fact, the results has Campos Racing’s Dorian Boccolacci in fourth with UNI-Virtuosi Racing’s Guanyu Zhou fifth, MP Motorsport’s Artem Markelov sixth, Carlin’s Louis Deletraz seventh, Hubert eighth, Trident’s Ralph Boschung ninth and ART’s Nikita Mazepin 10th.

At the back, MP Motorsport’s Mahaveer Raghunathan lost a place to BWT Arden’s Tatiana Calderon to be 16th after he was found guilty in the incident with Campos Racing’s Jack Aitken. He received a drive-through penalty which was converted to a 20s time penalty.

Aside the individual penalties, F2 explained the reasoning behind keeping certain drivers a lap down on re-start after the red flag caused by the collision of Prema’s Mick Schumacher and Calderon. They incident caused a traffic jam where leaders came around behind them.

This meant, they already had a lap extra under their belt whereas everyone below Calderon couldn’t even complete the lap they were in. Under red flag conditions, while the drivers were placed in order they were before the stoppage but they weren’t unlapped.

The stewards took responsibility of the error and stated that they found no way to resolve it during the race as the leading set did have a lap done over others. So, the results will stay as it is with everyone from sixth and below finishing a lap down.

Full statement:

“The provisional results of Race 1 are protested because the grid order for the restart behind the safety car following the red flag period was not established according to Article 42 of the 2019 FIA F2 Sporting Regulations.

“The protest is well founded and the protester did not act in bad faith. The protest deposit is returned to the Competitor and the stewards take no further action. Upon receipt of the protest, the Stewards investigated the matter in depth with the Race Director, Race Control personnel and Timing personnel.

“In the course of this investigation it was revealed that Race 1 was suspended with a red flag that was not preceded by a safety car. The cars were subsequently correctly assembled in the pit lane under Article 41.3 of the aforementioned Sporting Regulations.

“In preparation for the restart, the cars were properly re-ordered in the pit lane in the order they crossed the last timing loop prior to the red flag period. A decision was subsequently made not to further adjust the restart order.

“Article 42.3 of the 2019 FIA F2 Sporting Regulations specifies the manner in which the restart order is to be re-established at the restart. That process was not executed in that those cars originally in pit lane ahead of the leader as well as lapped cars were not allowed to transit the course and join the restart order at the rear.

“While this procedure negatively impacted the remainder of the race by putting significantly more cars down a lap than would otherwise have been the case, the Stewards find no equitable method to resolve this error and accordingly leave the results from Race 1 as they stand.”

F2: De Vries survives red flag re-start to win Monaco feature race