Medland: Annoying grid penalties and safety cars – F1 needs a better way

The fastest championship in the world taking four hours to decide its own grid is poor, and compromise is needed on safety car regs, writes Chris Medland

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Late safety car signalled the end of the day's racing on Sunday – could the FIA have done things differently?

DPPI

This weekend’s Italian Grand Prix provided two main occasions where there was confusion and annoyance among many people – including myself – both working in Formula 1 and invested as a fan.

And what both incidents did was provide a reminder that not everything can be perfect at all times and there are occasions where you have to accept compromises or a best fit. But that’s not to say we can’t still try and improve.

It all started with the grid penalties, which is a system that causes plenty of debate every time we get a race such as Monza. In F1, teams and strategists will always identify the best time to make a decision from a sporting point of view, so it’s no surprise there are certain tracks that they all look to take grid penalties at.

Not only is that down to the fact that specific circuits offer the best chance of overtaking to minimise the impact of the penalty, but the knowledge that others will come to the same conclusion just reaffirms that choice as your deficit compared to your rivals is likely to be further limited.

Max Verstappen in practice for the 2022 Italian Grand Prix

Was Verstappen starting fourth or seventh? Apparently no-one knew

Eric Alonso/Getty Images

That said, nine different drivers taking a grid penalty in Monza was a little extreme, and the breadth of those drops – from five places for some to back of the grid for others – was a recipe for confusion.

I’ve got to hold my hands up and say I played a part in that, because of a lack of detail in the regulations. The sporting regulations state that any drivers forced to start from the back of the grid will be removed from the order and placed there once the rest of the grid has been organised. But other than that, there is nothing to explain how grid penalties will be applied.

Because of that, a process was outlined by the late Charlie Whiting, and at one stage a media briefing given to ensure it was understood. That essentially saw the grid opened up into as many positions were needed in order to apply penalties, leaving gaps as a driver was moved, and then closing it up in one go.

In that scenario, and with the process that is written into the sporting regulations, Max Verstappen’s five-place grid penalty would have dropped him to seventh, and then he’d have been promoted again by penalties for Sergio Perez, Lewis Hamilton and Carlos Sainz.

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Then Michael Masi took over as race director and understandably tried to tweak the process in order to ensure that if there was space – i.e. a driver qualified in a position where there were enough grid slots to take their full penalty – then the full drop would be applied.

Nothing wrong with that either, except for that fact that it isn’t written into the sporting regulations, and as soon as you start trying to do things a different way without a clear and obvious process for everyone to refer to, it’s going to get messy.

Speaking to different teams on Saturday night after qualifying, they had different ideas of how the grid was going to look. Some were obviously working on the premise of the grid being closed up in one go, leading to an expectation Verstappen would be fourth. Others were aware of Masi’s plan and assumed those with penalties would be frozen in position as the grid closed up, before being slotted in at the point their penalty should have dropped them to (or as close as possible).

EFreitas

Different approaches from different race directors appears to have added to confusion

François Flamand / DPPI

Of course, having two different race directors in place who didn’t come up with either approach themselves only added to the potential that the grid could be finalised in a different way, seeing as it’s not written into regulation.

While an FIA representative had jokingly said “don’t ask” when pushed on the grid procedure prior to qualifying, a number of hours afterwards they insisted the process was clear and obvious and that they could show us how it would be formed. But if it was clear and obvious, then there is a clear and obvious need to publish a provisional grid far more quickly.

It took one hour to run a qualifying session to set the starting order for the race, and then four times as long to finally turn that into a provisional grid. In a sport that wants to market itself as the fastest on the planet, that really isn’t good enough.

Given the race traces, simulations, millions of data points that the sport has, it would certainly not be the biggest challenge in the world to create a bit of software where you could input all of the grid penalties prior to qualifying, and then as soon as the final timed lap had been completed in Q3 it would generate a provisional grid.

Fans on-site shouldn’t be leaving the track not knowing for certain who is starting where the next day, and similarly those following from afar shouldn’t have to sit refreshing their phones for a result they can trust.

That fans then got a race that ended in non-racing conditions was also far from ideal, although at least on that occasion it was clear the FIA was (thankfully) following its accepted safety car procedures to the letter.

The clue is in the title and those procedures need to be robust and err on the side of caution, but there is a growing desire to avoid such a scenario in future and I’m on board, providing we remember it will still be imperfect.

If a safety car is required then automatically red-flagging races in the final 10 laps (or 10 per cent of the distance or wherever you want to draw the line) would prevent a yellow flag finish and ensure that drivers and teams are being asked to win a sporting battle rather than just roll across the line.

Pierre Gasly, 2020 Italian GP

Applying letter of law won’t always bring out most exciting result

Mark Thompson/Getty Images

But for every time that might create a thrilling finish to an otherwise dull race, it may well also result in a potential shock winner – think Pierre Gasly in Monza 2020 – having that moment snatched away with the race restart. Sometimes the court of public opinion will be desperate for an interruption that spices up a finish, other times the complete opposite.

However you handle situations late in a race that would require a safety car, the acceptance needs to be that the rules are not designed to provide the most popular winner in any given scenario, simply to deliver a racing finish. And that’s better than neutralising a sporting event before its agreed end point.

But it won’t be perfect in every situation. Nothing ever is.

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