Max Verstappen and Charles Leclerc questioned the wisdom of having two Formula 1 Race Directors in the wake of the 2022 Austrian Grand Prix weekend, packed with inconsistencies and confusion, plus far too many penalties, Formula 2 and Formula 3 included.
While the FIA, under President Mohammed Ben Sulayem have gone to great measures to raise the Race Stewarding and Race Director standards in Formula 1 since the start of this season.
But the questions are mounting amid dubious decisions, gaining exposure during the Austrian Grand Prix weekend.
This season the FIA-appointed Race Director role has been shared by Niels Wittich and Eduardo Freitas, with few knowing who is running what when. At least we struggle to figure out who is calling the shot from the ‘Eagle’s nest’ or how the decision-making process occurs with two in charge.
In Austria, in all the classes, some apparent racing incidents were penalised others not, and track limits exploitation was rife and confusing too. Penalties flew all race long making a mockery of the process as no one knew what was going on until the flag dropped.
Race winner Max Verstappen, second-placed Charles Leclerc and third-placed Lewis Hamilton were handed suspended fines of €10,000 for breaking parc ferme protocols; others on receiving end of the stick FIA Stewards’ were Sebastian Vettel, Guanyu Zhou, Geroge Russell, Lando Norris and Pierre Gasly. That’s a lot of penalties.
Verstappen: I think it’s more about working with the drivers
Asked about the stewarding and race directorship after a tense, entertaining race at Red Bull Ring, Verstappen told reporters: “I don’t think necessarily it depends on one race director, I think it’s more about working with the drivers instead of just keeping your stance and just being stubborn.
“You know, we want to make it better for everyone and it’s not like we’re fighting for ourselves. We have good conversations between the drivers and at the end of the day, the more or less, on most things we agree.
“Of course, everyone has their own opinions about certain things, but like track limits, I think track limits debate this weekend has been a bit of a joke, not only in F1 but in F2 and F3.
“It’s easy to say from the outside, yeah, but you have to just stay within the white lines. It sounds very easy, but it’s not because when you go that quick through a corner and some of them are a bit blind, if you have a bit more understeer, tyres are wearing, it’s easy to just go over the white line.
“But do we actually gain time? Maybe yes, maybe not. And to be honest, there’s only two or three corners where you can really just go a bit wider. And yeah, I don’t think we should have this value on one mill over that’s a penalty or whatever.
“Then just add a wall or put some gravel back where we… like Turn 6 on the exit. I think that’s great because there is gravel, you punish yourself if you go wide.
It just doesn’t look good for the sport
Max continued: “So these are things where we have to look into how we can make it better because also for the stewards and just the people involved with checking these track limits.
“I mean it’s almost impossible to check these kind of things because you need what… almost like one guy on one car the whole race to check the whole lap if he’s not going outside of the white line, where on this track, at least, in some places, you get naturally penalised if you just you know go a bit wider and you touch the gravels.
“These kind of things, I think it just doesn’t look good for the sport as well and this is just one thing. Then the other thing is racing incidents and stuff. Yeah for sure we can do better. I think we will work on it we’ll try to make it better,” insisted Verstappen who finished second in the race on Sunday.
Race winner Charles Leclerc also weighed in on the subject: “Consistency has always been a thing that we’ve searched for and you can always be better, obviously, two race directors, it makes it probably a bit more difficult.
“Whether it’s impossible to achieve a good level of consistency? I don’t think so. So, yeah, I don’t really have any solutions for now. But I do believe that probably with one race director, it might be a little bit easier to manage,” reckoned the Ferrari driver.
Hamilton, also in attendance, simply agreed with his colleagues: “Nothing to add, nothing to add. I agree with what they said.”