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Photo: European Le Mans Series
Panis Racing’s victory in the 4 Hours of Imola has been reinstated after “a significant and relevant new element” has led the team’s post-race penalty to be overturned.
Manuel Maldonado, Arthur Leclerc and Charles Milesi initially took victory in the third round of the championship but later lost that win as a result of a Full Course Yellow infringement for Milesi.
The stewards decision at the time argued that the Alpine Hypercar driver “speeded up too soon, anticipating the end of FCY,” thus being demoted to fifth and promoting AO by TF to first place.
However, stewards on Wednesday cited the emergence of “a significant and relevant new element” that has been presented after Panis exercised its right to review to appeal the decision.
The issued bulletin outlines that Panis presented data extracted from a data logger not included in the list of mandatory elements for control purposes, but is admissible as evidence as article 11.9.3.x of the International Sporting Code (ISC) states that “the Stewards may use any video or electronic system likely to assist them in reaching a decision.”
The presented data showed “an anticipation time that is significantly lower than the one indicated by the official data logger” and that “the same indication can be found when looking at the speed recorded by the competitor’s data logger and by the official data logger.”
This led the technical delegate to re-examine the data in depth, which showed the potential margins for small offsets, specific to Panis’ No. 65 Oreca 07 Gibson.
As a result, the stewards state that this gives “reasonable doubt” about the infringement that led to the post-race penalty.
“Due to this specific case of offsets in the data, and in relation to the nature of the alleged infringement, the stewards are unable to fully prove the alleged infringement,” the document outlines.
Panis was previously unable to present this data as, according to the bulletin, “the Panel of Stewards rendered decision No. 29 on the 7th July 2024 at 19:04 based on an infringement report received from the Technical Delegate at 16:42.
“The post-race Parc Fermé release was announced at 18:33 by the Race Director via the Series’ official messaging system.
“The time between the opening of Parc Fermé and the publication of the decision did not allow the Competitor, in the absence of an official opportunity to present their defense, to extract the data presented in their request for the right of review.”
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