Max Verstappen will almost certainly have a grid penalty later in the Formula 1 season as the engine damaged in his British Grand Prix crash will not be raced again.
Verstappen started the final race weekend before the summer break in Hungary with the same power unit that was in his Red Bull during his crash at Silverstone, which was triggered by a controversial collision with title rival Lewis Hamilton.
Honda made some repairs to that engine without breaking any of the FIA’s seals and was initially convinced that it was OK to keep using as it passed all possible inspections prior to the weekend and then ran fine on the Friday.
It performed normally in qualifying as well but then Honda discovered the power unit was cracked when it carried out a physical inspection.
Verstappen had to switch to a brand new power unit for the Hungarian GP itself, which was his third set of major components of the season.
Drivers can use three each of the international combustion engine, MGU-H, turbocharger and MGU-K in a season and using more than that limit triggers an automatic grid drop.
Honda sent the cracked power unit to Sakura for analysis in the hope of salvaging it but The Race understands it is not going to be used in races again this season. It may be used as a Friday practice engine at some point but that is not considered likely.
With as many as 12 races left in the season and Verstappen already one race into his third power unit and only a high-mileage early-season engine still in the pool, switching to a fourth power unit at some point is now all but guaranteed.
Verstappen’s team-mate Sergio Perez faces the same situation. His engine was terminally damaged in the Hungarian GP in another accident caused by a Mercedes driver.
Perez’s power unit lost water and failed after he was speared into by Valtteri Bottas in the first corner melee at the start.
