The Andretti Formula E team believes it was robbed of a potential runner-up finish in the first race of the Tokyo E-Prix weekend - in which Jake Dennis was penalised for a pitlane infraction and shown a rare black flag that ended his race.
Dennis elected to pit for his mandatory Pit Boost energy boost stop as the race was about to be restarted after a red-flag period. The field re-assembled for the formation lap before the second grid start of the day, whereupon Dennis was called into the pits, which he and the team believed had been communicated as open.
The Andretti Porsche pitted while the grid formed and took the energy boost.
But despite the FIA declaring via its official messaging system that the pitlane was open, Dennis was subsequently retired from the race after being issued with a black flag for an illegal pitlane entry.
“We still need to fully analyse it, but we as a team believed that the pitlane entry was open,” Dennis told The Race.
“We thought it was fair game and we could take the Pit Boost. But the FIA believed the pits were closed.”
Dennis was black-flagged under Article 23.16 of the sporting regulations that state "under exceptional circumstances, the race director may ask for the pit entry to be closed during the race for safety reasons".
That article continues to detail that “at such times, drivers may only enter the pit lane in order for essential and entirely evident repairs to be carried out on the car. A penalty under Article 16.3 will be imposed on any driver who, in the opinion of the stewards, entered the pitlane for any other reason whilst it was closed".
The blow-by-blow
The Race obtained an official timeline of the race direction on-screen communications that ultimately led to Dennis’ race ending penalty. They read as follows:
15:50:45 – Pit Entry Closed
15:52:07 – Green Light – Pit Lane Open
15:52:10 – Safety Car Deployed
15:52:33 – Safety Car in This Lap
15:53:53 – Pit Exit Closed
The Race was told by the Andretti team that Dennis entered the pitlane at 15:54:55, meaning that according to the above official timing inputs that he did so after the Green Light/Pit Lane Open message was displayed.
“As we came round to form up on the grid, as far as we were concerned, the status of the pitlane was that the entry was open,” Andretti team principal Roger Griffiths told The Race.
“That was based off the messages passed from race control to the teams. And that's the only indication that we have as a team as to what the status of the pitlane was.”
As per the regulations the pit exit was notified as remaining closed until the Safety Car Line 2 and henceforth, once all the cars had passed that point, the pitlane exit would open and then Dennis could leave.
“That was our expectation,” said Griffiths.
“But we were unaware that there was a red light on the pitlane entry for Turn 17 – and there was no status to indicate that the pit entry was closed.
“Jake said he didn't see one - and apparently we've been shown that that light was on, which was potentially visible to the driver. But there was no light at the end of the pitlane to indicate it was closed.
"And we were aware that that was the case because I think they'd said that in the drivers' briefing. But the key thing for us was that the race control messages that we received did not reflect the actual status of the pitlane. And so far we've been unable to get an answer to that.”
Was the black flag justified?
Dennis became only the second driver in Formula E history to be black-flagged in an event. The first had been another series champion, Lucas di Grassi (pictured above), after the famous so-called ‘Lucas Loophole’ incident at the inaugural London E-Prix in 2021 when the Brazilian cut through the pitlane in an attempt to jump the safety car queue and make up positions.
Dennis was given the black flag almost immediately after his perceived indiscretion. “Maybe a drive-through or something [would have been fairer] but to give me a black flag was on the harsh side,” he felt.
“To give me a drive-through or even a 30-second stop-and-go, to put me to the back, sure…but to have to sit out 40 percent of the race was a bit boring from my side.”
When asked when the last time he had got black-flagged, Dennis replied: “In karting, maybe! A long time ago.”
Griffiths was visibly bristling when asked if the sanction was justified. He said: “I believe - and I need to double-check this - that our understanding is that the maximum penalty that would normally be applied in the circumstances of entering a closed pit would be a stop-and-go.
“However, we've been disqualified. We don't understand why we've been disqualified either.”
Prior to the restart of the race, then-leader Oliver Rowland lobbied his team directly to ensure that the pitlane remained closed so his competitors would be unable to complete the Pit Boost on the formation lap.
The championship points leader and his engineer Johann Aime discussed the point as follows:
OR: “Can we make sure they close the pitlane on this out lap?”
JA: “Exactly what we’re discussing.”
OR: “Just make sure they f***ing do it, else it’s going to be a complete s***show for FE. You can’t put someone on a standing start and then in to do a pitstop. Just make sure it doesn’t happen.”
When informed of this exchange by The Race, Griffiths said that “maybe he [Rowland] probably suddenly realised what potentially could happen”.
“He's a smart driver and he realised that there was this potential loophole where we could maybe leapfrog him. And he was trying to encourage the FIA to close the pits.
“Because when I think about it, what happens if we did come round on that lap to form up on the grid and we brushed the wall and got a puncture?
“We're obviously not going to take the race start with a puncture. We're going to enter the pits; we'll change a cut tyre and go back out.
“Would we have been disqualified for doing that? I mean, based on what happened, I'd have to say yes.”
Under the Article 16.3 menu of penalties that was quoted in the official decision issued by the FIA for the Dennis infraction, only time penalties of five and 10 seconds, a drive-through penalty and a 25-second stop/go sanction are listed as options to be applied.
