You wouldn’t want that to be a possibility?
After yesterday's debacle, I really wouldn't want the race director to have any discretion as to how to interpret rules! 🙂 That was exactly the problem - Masi made it up on the fly rather than following the rule book, if the rules had been applied as written there could be no complaints. Instead it was gifted to the contender on the day who'd been consistently slower - faster guy did absolutely everything right and still lost the title.
On top of that, surely there’s some provision for the SC staying out after that call if something else happens? Regulation 48.Grosjean perhaps. It can’t be absolutely absolute.
The regs state the _earliest_ that an SC should come in. If something happens after it is called in but before the race resumes then a new SC period is called and the process just starts again
You wouldn’t want that to be a possibility?
What you’re describing is something that involves the explicit agreement of all parties. Which, for one thing, is rather unlikely because it requires someone to give up an advantage for no good reason, and which, for another, is entirely different to yesterday’s safety call where one team was lobbying for one racing lap and the other was vehemently objecting to the exceptional procedure.
Sure, pragmatism is one thing, but giving teams guidance on which they base their decisions, and then moving the goalposts with no notice, is quite another.
Had Mercedes been informed this would happen, their best bet would have been to pit Hamilton for softs. As it stood, their best bet was staying out because absolutely everything indicated that unless the Williams was cleared in no time at all, the race would finish under SC.
Thoroughly dislike the man
He's remarkably graceless, whether winning or not. Has anyone seen a transcript of the conversation between Red Bull and race control under the SC? I suspect that would make for interesting reading.
There certainly wasn't agreement by all parties!... 🙂
Same on the red flag. Change of tyres – go back 5 grid places on the restart.
I think it's OK to let them fettle on Red flags. In fact I would have red flagged it as soon as I realised (If I were race director) there was no way to end it without being specifically disadvantageous to either driver. Should have red flagged with 3 or 4 to go. Everyone gets fresh rubber, with race positions reset - straight forward few lap race for the win.
He’ll always know, in his heart, that it wasn’t done the right way.
I’ll guarantee that won’t be the case.
You wouldn’t want that to be a possibility?
No. Rules is rules.
Some require judgement, who was at fault in this crash or that crash, was that deliberate, did that driver gain an advantage, but once a decision is reached the rules state what should happen and that is what should happen. And in terms of how the race is run I can't see there being any interpretation for it to be open to, it may be a judgement call for instance whether to have a VSC or full SC but once that call is made the rules say how it should work.
Once we have a RD making it up as he goes along we have chaos, no rule can be taken as fixed. Massi has to go
Should have red flagged with 3 or 4 to go. Everyone gets fresh rubber, with race positions reset – straight forward few lap race for the win.
If they MUST create an artificial shoot out, that would have been the way to do it.
don't get me wrong, I'm just posing a counter-opinion. Personally I think it was an awful decision. Irrespective of whether the regs allow for discretion, the purpose of the officials is to apply the laws without favour, and to not influence the outcome of the event in doing so.
They got it wrong, by both application of the regs, and in that race at least by influencing the outcome.
Whether over the course of a season these things even out, IDK.
Should have red flagged with 3 or 4 to go. Everyone gets fresh rubber, with race positions reset – straight forward few lap race for the win.
Hindsight is wonderful, pretty sure Massi will be thinking excctly that this morning too.
Massi has to go
I would have thought so. But then maybe Liberty Media are absolutely delighted with the outcome. It will be talked about for years. Its sets up a perfect narrative for the 2022 season. I can almost hear the trailer style voiceover
Should have red flagged with 3 or 4 to go. Everyone gets fresh rubber, with race positions reset – straight forward few lap race for the win.
100% agree. The whole debacle was a shambles. If the FIA/F1 really, really want to mix things up from a false "entertainment" point of view, red flag the race, let them all change tyres and have a lap or two as a shootout. It's not ideal from a Mercedes/Lewis point of view, but at least it's fairer and everyone know where they stand, rather than having to make title changing decisions without knowing all the facts.
As some drivers have said, if this any other race or the title had been decided, it would have ended under safety car.
I'm not angry about Max being champion, but if the shoe was on the other foot and Lewis won it in that way Red Bull would be equally fuming and we'd still be in the same position, so the issue is clearly with the FIA and Masi. There is no way in well Charlie would have let anything like this go down. Masi lost control a while ago and he should resign and apologise to all the teams. Other drivers lost the opportunity Max was given because not all cars were allowed to unlap themselves. I can't see that CAS will have a good view of the way things were handled if it ends up going that far... The decisions made in those last few laps smack of incompetence and complete disregard for keeping the race a fair sporting contest for all competitors.
They need to look at tarmac run off areas too.
I can't imagine that the FIA are happy that they, and Massi, are the headlines today
Should have red flagged with 3 or 4 to go. Everyone gets fresh rubber, with race positions reset – straight forward few lap race for the win.
If only there was precedent for a red flag right near the end when an SC would probably do. Oh wait, Baku.
I can’t imagine that the FIA are happy that they, and Massi, are the headlines today
Oh, they'll be fuming - what the hell do they do now? Masi's dropped em right in it - can't imagine the result will be changed, but how stupid do they look?
There certainly wasn’t agreement by all parties!… 🙂
Maybe those other teams should have protested too....as someone else said, if Riciardo and someone else hadn't been between Sainz and Verstappen, Sainz might have attacked, forcing Max to defend and so not overtake Lewis. (Or maybe they'd have both passed him...😁)
They should write that sort of thing in. No safety car in the last six laps, always a red flag instead. And so on.
Spectacle is good, there’s no inherent problem with that. But create the framework for it before the racing, not during.
Bez +1
The pitting under SC needs looking at too. Fine if everybody can benefit equally, but clearly that’s not possible and it doesn’t seem fair that the driver who has been fastest and built up a good lead can be so disadvantaged. Of course they have to bunch behind the SC as the whole point is to create time for Marshall’s to run about on the track with no cars about, so they can’t change that.
Not sure a red flag would have been entirely fair, Max was on much younger tyres and catching at almost the required rate to give him a chance on the last lap, also Hamilton's tyres could have fallen off a cliff or punctured late on. Lando had to pit for a puncture before Latifi's shunt and his tyres were a similar age to Lewis'...
Also don't agree with how it finished though but don't think there would have been a perfect solution, looked to dangerous for a VSC to shift Latifi's car.
there was no way to end it without being specifically disadvantageous to either driver.
Yes there was. Just leave those 5 cars between Lewis and Max. Lewis would have had enough to get around and win.
10 laps from the end Horner has already all but conceeded defeat and said Merc were too good on the day.
Max was on much younger tyres and catching at almost the required rate to give him a chance on the last lap,
Are you sure?
Max was on much younger tyres and catching at almost the required rate to give him a chance on the last lap, also Hamilton’s tyres could have fallen off a cliff or punctured late on
A tyre failure was an outside possibility—though Hamilton is generally one of the best at looking after tyres and if I recall they weren’t extending beyond Pirelli’s guidance—but Max was nowhere near closing on Lewis on pure pace; they were pretty much on the same lap times and had been since a couple of laps after Max pitted.
Sainz might have attacked
I’m struggling to see this. Reckon it’d be more likely he’d not want to interfere with a title fight in the last round
Oh, they’ll be fuming – what the hell do they do now? Masi’s dropped em right in it
It's largely a problem of their own making though. The FIA have rounded up a whole bunch of roles since 2019 when Whiting died, who'd been doing the role without a job description for decades, and thrown them all at Masi who's probably got too much to do come race day, and hasn't got nearly enough support.
One of the Sky pundits (Nico I think) said on Saturday after qualis that he wouldn't want that role for all the money in the world.
I still don't really understand why you have to bunch the cars under a safety car.
It dates back to cars that didn't have electronic control, GPS etc. so there was no real other way to do it.
But nowadays, why not just have the virtual safety car? Gap between cars is maintained but they all slow down to whatever speed is deemed acceptable. They could even do it so the cars can go faster away from the accident to maintain tyre temps etc. but then slow right down past the incident.
Why is it deemed acceptable that a team who has built a lease for the whole race, loses it because someone else has a crash?
Max was nowhere near catching Lewis at the required rate.
Max was on much younger tyres and catching at almost the required rate to give him a chance on the last lap,
This is absolute rubbish. The gap had stabilised WHILST Hamilton passed those 4 cars. Max had 5 to get passed and was still near 12secs back. He was never in with a sniff, hence Horner's comments with 10laps to go.
I still don’t really understand why you have to bunch the cars under a safety car.
I was thinking the same but the main point I guess is the give the marshals a chance to clear debris. Bunch them all together and once thats done you have at least a minute, minute and half of traffic free road to go out and sweep debris, move a telehandler across the track etc every lap of the bunch.
I guess you could 'fan' them out afterwards with gps positions but than might be a complete mission to achieve. Or released from the pitlane by car number at the gaps at the time of the safety car going out (so they circuit the track to keep tyres sort of warm then go into the pitlane with the safety car and get spat out with time gaps restored).
However that would be prioritising fair racing. This mob probably quite like stirring it all up to generate pay per view thrillz for teenage boys. As binners said a few pages back, if they could find a way of engineering in mario kart banana skins I'm sure they'd have done it by now.
Ah yeah. Good point about creating a gap for the Marshalls to work in.
Although they could do that and then just before the safety car comes in they spread all the cars back out again. It can't be that hard with all the telemetry and data in those cars to reset the gaps at an appropriate time.
Let’s face facts: the primary function of the safety car is to create close racing and excitement. But that’s fine! Teams don’t object to it because they know about it, everyone has the same risk, everyone can factor it into their decision-making, and so on. Sure, it’s a lottery in that you sometimes benefit and sometimes lose out, but it’s fine because everyone accepts it, and audiences love it because it spices things up. And it’s not too gimmicky, like banana skins or other ideas like sprinkler systems or long laps (we’ll overlook DRS for the moment).
But again, it’s about building that framework for a spectacle before you go racing, not deciding on a whim that a new procedure applies today.
But again, it’s about building that framework for a spectacle before you go racing, not deciding on a whim that a new procedure applies today.
That. It really doesn't matter what the rules are. What matters is that they are known in advance and applied consistently
Do you also factor in YOUR job into your climate impact?
Aye my 6mile commute 3 days a week is up there with someone jetting around the world every weekend and burning hundreds of litres of fuel and trashing umpteen sets of tyres.
If it bothered him that much hed stop doing it and go live off grid in the arse end of nowhere. Empty words from him. Our jobs are not even in same carbon footprint league.
Hold on I see a light left switch on otherside of building let me go shout at someone for killing a dolphin with their reckless attitude to the environment.
Is there any reason for actually having a safety car anyway?
For safety. Wasn’t it introduced to reduce the number of first-corner collisions on restarts?
If that was the case, you'd just do all starts as a rolling start using a pace car to get them formed up. It doesn't make any sense to have red flag restarts as standing starts if standing starts are unsafe. Same goes for regular race starts.
If you want to actually make it safe for the marshals and rescue crews to work after a crash, then just red flag every major incident and put cars to the back of the grid if they want to work on the car.
Slightly too early to start the 2022 F1 thread but here's to hoping that Merc produce a 2022 engine that's 150bhp up on the Redbull inhouse 2022 engine with Honda now leaving the scene. Horner's face with a RB struggling to get into the top 10 each race in 2022 would be a sweet turnaround! 😀
The safety car is definitely necessary at times but creates unfair situations, perhaps they should all form a grid for the restart with timed lights to match their race positions/timing gaps
If it bothered him that much hed stop doing it and go live off grid in the arse end of nowhere.
It’s great that your carbon footprint is apparently lower, but how many people are listening to your arguments and observing the changes you’re making? I’m guessing your global audience is roughly this thread, and I suspect no-one here is responding to your sarcasm and whataboutery by changing their own actions.
If that was the case, you’d just do all starts as a rolling start using a pace car to get them formed up. It doesn’t make any sense to have red flag restarts as standing starts if standing starts are unsafe. Same goes for regular race starts.
Everyone knows that, but the grid start is one of the differentiators between F1 and other top levels of motorsport, so it'll never change
If it bothered him that much hed stop doing it and go live off grid in the arse end of nowhere. Empty words from him. Our jobs are not even in same carbon footprint league.
Appreciate that this is going a bit off-topic from the main thrust of the thread but there's an article here (from a couple of years ago) about F1's carbon footprint. Most of it is not the actual racing, it's the carting thousands of tonnes of kit around the world:
Undoubtedly there's some green-washing in there too - glib words about tree-planting and offsets mixed in with some "well if it wasn't for F1 tech [x, y and z] wouldn't have been developed which are greener than what came before".
However, top sportspeople have a global platform of millions so can use that position to drive change on all manner of issues.
How about to finish the SC, all into the pits and let out by lights timed to the pre-SC time gaps. If you need to change tyres for safety reasons, you can, but leave the pits last.
The safety car is definitely necessary at times but creates unfair situations, perhaps they should all form a grid for the restart with timed lights to match their race positions/timing gaps
Yeah I agree that something needs to change as the current regulations do make it really unfair.
Seems reasonable, although would actually negate the need for the SC, just make them all pit (essentially a red flag).
Would Masi have done the same thing if LH and MV’s positions were swapped when the SC was declared?
It looks like MV needed all the ‘Frankly Incomprehensible Assistance’ he could get.
"The whining to the RD definitely needs to stop, I can understand Toto’s dismay on the last lap, but the earlier one about the SC was not on."
The thing is, this is how Masi operates. In Saudi we all heard him and Horner bartering for am outcome. "Here's the deal" (or words to that effect). What are Merc to do? Sit there and say nothing as the whole world listens to RB and the RD negotiate the rules?
The race directors' job is to direct a race, not a movie.
