Originally Posted by sollitt
I'm not, for a moment suggesting that this act ought have been punished. A question was asked and you gave an emphatic answer ... which was wrong. Is picking up your gear and taking it with you not part of completing a task? If somebody else picks an item up and hands it to you is that not assisting? Of course it is ... and it doesn't matter at all whether the tyre is already on the car.
In a competition of this status in which the difference between winning and coming 2nd is often a couple of seconds, this is exactly the kind of thing a rival team might take more than a passing interest in.