The ‘peculiar scenario’ that led to Esteban Ocon’s strange extra pit stop at the Las Vegas Grand Prix

Esteban Ocon was actually handed a drive-through penalty at the Las Vegas Grand Prix when he was called for a pit stop by his Alpine team without them ready to service his car.

The Frenchman had yet to pit against the other cars around him and was running in P5 behind Nico Hulkenberg, when the team told him to “box face” the Haas driver 11 laps into the race.

As Ocon headed to the pit lane, the Alpine mechanics were still in the garage and not ready to service his car in the pit. Ocon assumed he had missed his pit mark and was forced to stop again on the next lap, losing him 12 seconds in the process.

Photo by Meg Oliphant – Formula 1/Formula 1 via Getty Images

It was a bizarre scenario that put Ocon behind for the rest of the race, dropping him to 17th place at the checkered flag of the Las Vegas GP. Discussing what happened on The Race F1 podcast, journalist Edd Straw explained why it happened to Ocon.

The Alpine team is not ready to serve Esteban Ocon when the call comes

Footage of the attempted pit stop showed Ocon entering the pits and only one mechanic standing by when he arrived. Ocon left and lost time having to return to the pits.

“In this particular scenario, Ocon received a ‘box, opposite Hülkenberg’ call, meaning if Hülkenberg doesn’t object, you will and vice versa. Ocon followed that instruction because Hülkenberg stayed away, so he came in and went down the pit lane and said he didn’t see the pit sign,” Straw said.

“He didn’t see it because the crew wasn’t in the pit lane. The team said something went wrong, but from what I can gather the pit crew gets a warning a certain number of seconds in advance.

“Then there will be confirmation, and I guess they were waiting but didn’t get the final green light. Either someone didn’t call or there was a technical problem.

How it happened on Esteban Ocon’s team radio

Team radio transcripts of the incident appear to show that Ocon was suffering from tire degradation near the end of the stint and wanted to return to the pits.

His engineer, Josh Peckett, seemed to confirm that they were ready to take him on in any scenario on the lap he initially arrived in (lap 11), but Ocon had to come through the pits.

Driver	Engineer
	Peckett: “Okay, Esteban, how are the tires, please?”
Ocon: “Degrading. A little more with each turn.	Peckett: “Copy that.” Esteban, box this round. Opposite Hulkenberg. Take this turn, facing Hülkenberg in front.
	Ocon in the pits but no mechanic is waiting for him Peckett: “Okay, Esteban, I need you to correct the mistakes, please. press “OK” twice.
Ocon: “F…what happened?” I haven’t seen the table?
	Peckett: “It’s okay, buddy. Just cross. Drive-in theater.”
Ocon: “F—— damn…”	Peckett: “Okay, buddy. All right. Everything is fine. Settle down. So car behind Tsunoda, for now.

It was a disappointing end to the weekend for Alpine after a strong Sao Paulo GP, as the points-less double leaves it behind Haas in the constructors’ standings.

Each place could be worth around £8million, which could impact the distribution of prize money at the end of the season.