Bruno Senna says he was surprised to be given a drive through penalty in Valencia after contact with Kamui Kobayashi.
The FIA stewards deemed that Senna had moved across on the Japanese driver after Kimi Raikkonen had passed him on the inside, and the Sauber tried to take the same route. Senna had a spectacular half spin, and suffered a rear puncture, which led to a slow run back to the pits.
“It was a little bit surprising, but we’ve seen that happening before and hopefully it won’t happen again,” Senna told this blog. “It was one of those days.
“Kimi had a run on me, which was fair enough. After he overtook me, I ducked behind him. Kobayashi was obviously desperate to overtake me, he was on KERS as well, because he was really coming out of the corner.
“When I was sideways in the middle of the track I was a bit scared because I thought that people could really hit me hard. Fortunately none of that happened. I managed to recover fast.
“There was no way he was going to overtake me there. If he had waited another five seconds he could have overtaken me out of Turn 10, which is where he should have tried really. Considering the difference in tyres, it was a no-brainer, really. Disappointing in many ways, but especially for the penalty we got. That’s racing, hopefully I’ll have better luck next time.”
Senna eventually finished 11th, and was gifted a point for 10th after team mate Pastor Maldonado’s penalty.
Not counting the drive through, his only stop was the one on lap 20 when he came in with his puncture.
“We were going to make a one-stop work. I did one stop effectively, I just had about a minute penalty in the middle, which didn’t help. But we made it work. It looked good for us. We were racing Schumacher and Webber, and could have finished where they finished.”
Adam Cooper F1 
I agree that it was a harsh penalty. In my opinion Kobayashi wasn’t sufficiently alongside to justify assigning responsibility for the accident to Senna. As DC said in the BBC commentary at the time, it was just a racing incident.
Completely agree, besides that Bruno lost a lot of time coming to the pits very slowly with that puncture
Today it can not just be a racing incident. They have to be punished… But if it is a nobrainer in Sennas mind why does he defend so hard when his tires are gone. Now it is both in Spain and Valencia he lost good points…
Was he defending at all when Kobayashi hit him? I saw it as Senna recovering to the racing line and Kamui crashing into the back of him.
I really dislike the way penalties are handed out these days.
Think Mika Salo is not suitable for stewarding role, KOB definitely misjudged his position on the track relative to Bruno and the wall, poor SEN had done nothing wrong. KOB is still driving like he’s in a GP2 car. Mean, it’s obvious that if you no longer go for a gap, you’re no longer a racing driver but the gap in this case was too small, I’d not even call it a gap, it was a sort of like a space, very limited space in a given moment in time, milliseconds and that tiny bit of space was about to be occupied by Senna’s Williams. Push hard, make it happen, but respect the other drivers. I’m sure these dudes are aware of how safe the cars are nowadays so they can hit objects and other cars; for sure, some 20 or 30 years ago people were more careful, you know.
Also, penalties are becoming a bit of a joke, a bit like soccer if you ask me, I know you won’t but let’s pretend you will.
How could Kobayashi be at fault when the accident occured at what was basically a straight? How was Kobayashi agreesive when he was trying to pass on a straight? The space wouldnt have disappeared if Senna hadnt moved across, and he shouldnt have moved across on a straight if there is already another caar beside him. Senna deserve the drive through. Rosberg got away with it in Bahrain only cos Lewis and Alonso was still behind, for Senna it is different cos Kobayashi was already there!
Bruno has had a tough year as I don’t think he has the same support as Maldonado does with the team. In a world of limited resources this is just reality and it takes a while to come into your own. However, when your fighting for a future in F1 I can only imagine how hard it is for a driver to have great opportunities scrubbed by such incidents and then be penalized for something that was a racing incident. Bruno must have been informed that Kobayashi was in the area and could have exercised a little bit more caution in returning to the racing line but come on…
I would just call it a racing incident.