Drivers unhappy with Wickens pole

Second place qualifier Neel Jani led the protests, telling autosport.com: "There is a straight rule for yellow flags, you should not improve your sector time.

"I'm definitely not happy, because I gave away a lot in the braking zone because I could see the yellow. Rules are rules, but in this case it seems like it got a bit bent."

Wickens's sector time in the final part of the track was 32.136 seconds, which was quicker than his time in the previous session by 0.008 seconds - and some 0.157 seconds faster than Jani's past the same yellow flag.

However, Jani's overall best sector time in the first sprint race session was even faster - 32.006 seconds, suggesting that Wickens did lift off.

Wickens was adamant he backed off, but it appears that such was the close margins in the session, the fact he lifted less than Jani was enough to give him pole.

Race stewards investigated the situation at the time, and were happy to let Wickens's time stand.