Isack Hadjar has been given a three-place grid penalty at the Canadian Grand Prix for impeding Carlos Sainz in qualifying.
Red Bull Formula 1 rookie Hadjar qualified ninth in another impressive showing at the Racing Bulls team.
But he incurred the wrath of Williams driver Sainz for an incident in Q1, which was a clear-cut case of impeding.
Sainz was on a push lap when he caught Hadjar, on an in-lap, on the entry to the Turn 6-7 chicane and Hadjar moved off the racing line too late to get out of his way. It directly impacted Sainz's qualifying as it ruined his final lap and meant he was knocked out in Q1 in 17th.
"That completely blows your qualifying away and means your weekend is destroyed," said a furious Sainz.
"I lost three or four tenths just in that lap, which is anyway a lap that is 0.20s from Q2 - which shows the margin we had. So it's honestly very frustrating."
Hadjar initially sounded baffled as he thought Sainz had aborted his lap because that's what his team had told him. He said to the stewards he could see Sainz in his mirrors but was relying on what his race engineer had said - then realised the information was wrong so tried to move out the way as best he could.
The stewards gave Hadar a three-place penalty because that is considered standard "regardless of whether the incident was the fault of the driver of the team".
It drops Hadjar to 12th, promoting Williams driver Alex Albon to ninth, Franco Colapinto to 10th for Alpine, and Sauber's Nico Hulkenberg to 11th.
Sainz will start 16th as Yuki Tsunoda's grid penalty elevates Sainz one place.
"I don't care about tomorrow right now," Sainz said immediately after qualifying. "My brain is on how disappointed I am with today's outcome."
Hadjar was also criticised by Charles Leclerc in qualifying, for supposedly hurting the Ferrari driver's final effort in Q3 - coincidentally at the same corner Hadjar impeded Sainz.
This 'incident' was a matter of Leclerc complaining about a dirty air effect, with Hadjar a few car lengths ahead and not pushing - which the stewards took no issue with, and Leclerc softened his stance later too.
"Obviously emotions are running high when you are in the car, I don't think he's done anything wrong," said Leclerc once he had calmed down afterwards.
"But we know how it is. Sometimes depending on where you are catching a car it can have a huge influence on the lap, it had a huge influence on me.
"I just wanted to obviously warn him – what I said in the car, I was quite angry, but there's nothing wrong with what Isack has done."
