In other changes for 2024, drivers who cause a red flag in qualifying could now lose their fastest lap time. According to the tweaked article 33.5, a driver deemed to be the “sole cause” of a red flag cannot continue in qualifying, “and their fastest lap time during the session may be deleted.”
I’d argue it shouldn’t matter what the cause is. It’s a little far fetched, but I could imagine teams organizing mechanical failures to gain an unfair advantage. All it would take is to tell the driver the wrong gearbox mode to cause a spin, Monaco style. As written it would suck to have an honest car failure and then lose extra grid places, but I think those kind of incidents will be pretty equally spread among the field.
I don’t see that happening. Teams can do exactly what you’ve described right now without any risk of penalty, and it doesn’t appear to be happening.
If teams aren’t doing that currently why would the start when there’s the potential for a penalty?
I mean, many folks would say that’s what leclerc did successfully in 2021. That’s a bit of a conspiracy, and doesn’t make a ton of sense (gearbox penalty etc.) but it’s not impossible.