Five-place gearbox penalty for Grosjean

Romain Grosjean will go into his final race for Lotus this afternoon with a five-place grid drop, after the team decided to make a late, unscheduled gearbox change on the Frenchman’s car in Abu Dhabi.

Grosjean had qualified 15th after transmission issues struck near the end of Q2, forcing to him to pull his E23 Hybrid off the Yas Marina Circuit. His penalty comes as the result of the gearbox failing to complete the required six events.

Meanwhile, Roberto Merhi will start from the pit lane after Marussia made suspension set-up changes to his car under Parc Ferme conditions. The Spaniard had qualified 20th.

With Merhi’s team mate Will Stevens already carrying a five-place penalty for a Control Electronics unit change, the revised provisional grid thus reads:

Rosberg, Hamilton; Raikkonen, Perez; Ricciardo, Bottas; Hulkenberg, Massa; Kvyat, Sainz; Verstappen, Button; Maldonado, Nasr; Vettel, Alonso; Ericsson, Stevens; Grosjean, Merhi.