On an extremely slippery circuit, Verstappen went deep into Turn 1 and forced polesitter Leclerc to go off the track with him, coming out of the corner in front of the Ferrari driver.
The incident was soon investigated by the FIA stewards but rather than giving the position back to Leclerc Red Bull decided to cop a five-second penalty instead. Verstappen therefore enjoyed free air for the first stint as he tried to build a gap to offset the penalty taken the first pitstop.
