F1 hopeful slapped with race ban after picking up 18 penalty points in 10 days

F1 hopeful Nicola Lacorte has been handed a one-race ban after receiving 18 penalty points in 10 days. The F3 driver endured nightmare weekends in Monaco and Barcelona and will miss the Spielberg race in Austria at the end of June.

Lacorte, 18, moved into single-seated racing in 2022 and has been part of the Alpine academy since 2023. Last year he competed in the Formula Regional Oceania and European Championships, where he finished 19th and 21st overall respectively. He then joined DAMS Lucas Oil for his maiden F3 campaign and will be eyeing up an F1 seat in the future.

During qualifying in Monaco in late May, Lacorte received marshal assistance at Turn One to return to the track and was issued with a black flag. But he continued the session as he was unaware that he had been disqualified.

He was slapped with five penalty points for the incident and then received another two for causing a collision with Santiago Ramos in the Monaco Sprint Race.

Last weekend, the teenager's nightmare run continued in Barcelona as he was served with another four penalty points after instigating a collision with Jose Garfias.

That left him just one penalty point away from a suspension, which was ultimately dished out to him due to the fact he was below the minimum delta time at eight marshalling sectors in a row during a Safety Car period in the main event in Spain.

That infringement was enough to earn him three points, which took his tally across the two weekends to 14 points. Drivers are banned after hitting the 12-point threshold, with the 12 points then removed from his licence.

His 13th and 14th points remained, with another three coming his way for further Safety Car delta time infringements.

And the youngster received one further penalty point after hitting into the rear of Brando Badoer's Prema in the latter stages of the feature race at the Barcelona circuit. He won't be able to return to the track until the Silverstone race at the start of July.

Lacorte's misfortune has left him 28th in this year's F3 standings. And he will be hoping for an upturn in form over the coming months after explaining at the start of the season: "It's my first time in a team that isn't Italian, so that's going to be a big experience for me as well.

"But I've already seen that the team works in a similar way to what I'm used to, which I really like."