Verstappen summoned to F1 stewards over Mexico yellow flag incident

The Red Bull driver, who took provisional pole position with his first lap of Q3, was the final driver to run through the final corner after Valtteri Bottas had crashed his Mercedes into the barriers.

Despite a single yellow flag being on display on the outside of the corner, Verstappen set a quicker sector time than he had on his previous lap.

His first time was good enough to secure his second career F1 pole after Ferrari's Charles Leclerc could not improve and other drivers backed off following Bottas's crash.

There were suggestions after qualifying that the mini sector times - which the FIA uses to judge how a driver has reacted in greater detail - did show he had slowed down towards the end of his final lap.

But, after Verstappen declared in the post-qualifying press conference that he had not slowed for the flags and with the stewards having looking closely at the matter, the FIA has summoned him for investigation.

When asked after qualifying about the incident, Verstappen said: "I was aware that Valtteri crashed."

When pushed further on if he had backed off, Verstappen said: "It didn't really look like it did it? No."

Verstappen was also defiant about keeping his foot in for the incident.

"I think we know what we are doing, otherwise we wouldn't be driving an F1 car," he said.

"It's qualifying and you go for it. If they want to delete the lap, then delete the lap."

F1 drivers are told explicitly in the FIA's pre-event notes at every race that they must slow down for yellow flags in qualifying.

If there is a single waved yellow, the FIA note states: "Drivers should reduce their speed and be prepared to change direction.

"It must be clear that a driver has reduced speed and, in order for this to be clear, a driver would be expected to have braked earlier and/or discernibly reduced speed in the relevant marshalling sector."