Carlos Sainz perhaps wisely chose not to give his honest reaction to the penalty which meant he would end the Australian Grand Prix with zero points.
The Spaniard was involved in a chaotic late race restart as every driver pushed as hard as they could to gain positions with just two racing laps to go. No fewer than five cars span in several incidents that all happened at once.
One of them saw Sainz tag the back wheel of Fernando Alonso, spinning his compatriot before the race was red flagged again. Alonso was able to restart in third place to secure another podium, but the stewards still took a dim view of the Ferrari racer's actions.
Sainz was slapped with a five-second time penalty. And, as the race ended behind the safety car, he had no opportunity to stretch out a gap behind him to mitigate the damage and, despite crossing the line fourth, finished 12th and last of the cars left running.
Realising that 12 points were about to be taken away from him, he was very emotional in his cockpit when told over the radio about the penalty. "No, it cannot be. Do I deserve to be out of the points? No," he said.
Sainz went on to plead with the stewards to delay the penalty until he could present his side of the story. He added: "It's unacceptable. Tell them, it's unacceptable. They need to wait until the race is finished and discuss it with me.
"Please. Ask them please, please, please, please to wait and discuss it with me. Clearly, the penalty is too severe." But those pleas fell on deaf ears and Ferrari went home with zero points from the race, after Charles Leclerc beached his car after a spin on the first lap.
Speaking to Spanish media after the race, Sainz avoided making comment while still so angry. "I prefer not to speak because I would say very ugly bad words. First I want to go talk to the stewards because the sanction is unfair," he said.
And he had a similar attitude in a very brief Sky Sports interview as, with a face like thunder, he said: "I prefer not to talk right now, honestly. I'm too disappointed. I'm going to see about things... this is the most unfair penalty I have seen in my life, so I prefer to go to the stewards now, have a conversation with them, and then talk to you guys.
