Bahrain Grand Prix qualifying result changes as George Russell punished for 'dodgy' act

Mercedes have been punished for their "dodgy" act during qualifying for the . had qualified second with team-mate fourth, but both drivers have now been handed a grid drop.

were placed under investigation over the incident which happened in the second part of qualifying. That section was interrupted by a red flag after lost control while on a flying lap and crashed his .

After the wreckage was cleared away, Mercedes were too hasty in their desire to get both their drivers back on track. Russell and Antonelli were cleared to leave their garages and drive to the end of the pit lane before an official restart time had been communicated by race control.

The medical car was still in the pit lane, dropping Ocon back off at the Haas garage at the time. The presence of the Mercedes cars did not interfere with the medical car's operations in any way.

But spotted that they had driven into the pit lane early, after being told by his team over the radio: "We cannot go out yet, we don't have an official restart time." The German described the Mercedes cars as "dodgy".

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Silver Arrows team principal admitted that they had made a mistake but hoped that the punishment would be financial rather than sporting. "There’s no precedent [for this incident]. It's a new rule in that sense and we're going to see what the stewards say," he said.

"I would hope that it's not the drivers who are penalised. It was a team mistake. We jumped the gun here and it was in Q2, [not] in Q3." His wish was not answered, though, and both his drivers were dropped one place each from their qualifying results.

It means Russell will now start Sunday's race third, with Antonelli still two places behind him but now fifth on the grid. moves onto the front row with pole-sitter while also benefits and will start fourth, now sandwiched between the two Mercedes cars.

Explaining the decision, the stewards said: "The team representative, Andrew Shovlin, in evidence stated that he gave the instruction for the cars to be released, in error, having misinterpreted the message posted on page three of the Timing Screen, 'estimated re-start time' to be a message advising the actual re-start time.

"He argued that there was no sporting advantage gained in this case as there was sufficient time remaining (11 minutes) for other teams to perform their run plans. It was also noted that the team's sporting director, Ron Meadows, was not present at the event and that normally he would be involved in the release process.

"The FIA Single Seater Sporting Director stated that such a move could be a sporting advantage in that it could enable a team to perform its run plan whereas other teams may not be able to. The stewards agree with this view particularly where there are only a few minutes remaining in the session.

"The FIA Sporting Director argued that there needed to be a sporting penalty rather than a team fine, otherwise in future teams would release their cars as soon as the estimated re-start time was published. The stewards agree with this view.

"Mr Shovlin argued that it was possible to give a non sporting penalty if the stewards declared that it was not to be taken as a precedent but also stated that if a sporting penalty was to be given, it should be mitigated.

"The stewards agreed with the view that this breach required a sporting penalty however accept that the breach was unintentional and a genuine mistake by the team, for which Mr Shovlin apologised. We decide to impose a one position grid penalty. A similar breach in different circumstances could entail a more severe sporting penalty in future."