Common sense approach to safety follows F1 Strategy Group meeting, by Ewan Marshall

"The three great essentials to achieve anything worthwhile are, first, hard work; second, stick-to-itiveness; third, common sense." 
- Thomas A. Edison

Increasing head protection in Formula One is a no brainer. While open cockpits should remain part and parcel of the sport, there is an increasing need to ensure that drivers are better protected from foreign objects or in the result of an accident. Although motor racing will also possess a level of danger, recent tragedies have unified all voices to try and find a solution.

The 'Halo' has been kicked into the 2018 long grass, at least
Photo: Octane Photography

Formula One is the undisputed standard bearer when it comes to improving safety, developing innovative new measures to car and track design, of which other series reap the rewards.

Everyone wants to see a solution introduced as soon as possible, however it would be foolish to force anything through without all concerns addressed or the support of all sides. Therefore, the F1 Strategy Group's decision to delay the Halo device until 2018 was the only sensible option.

Ultimately, the move has been challenged by those whose safety is in question. However, it is quite apparent that not all drivers are convinced that the device is the answer.

Problem solving

Of course, Daniel Ricciardo's disqualification from the Australian Grand Prix was a matter of considerable regret. And as a by-product it served to re-open the whole debate around possibly the one aspect of F1 that causes the most wrangling and self-disgust; perhaps most perplexes the uninitiated. That in this game we can have the event and in so doing establish the result apparently, only for it to be changed later by the stroke of an official's pen.

The Guardian's Paul Weaver for one railed on that very matter: 'Picking a winner from a heavyweight contest between silks is a hazardous business; identifying the loser is as easy as waving a chequered flag. It is the F1 fan...' he said. While the local paper in Melbourne the Herald Sun was more jarring in response to it all: displaying a large banner headline across its front page reading: 'Grand Farce'. Social media was laden with similar sentiment.

Despite all appearances, it turned out that
Daniel Ricciardo didn't finish second
 in the Australia Grand Prix after all
Photo: Octane Photography

But while we can cite this as a problem rather easily, and get embarrassed when it happens, is framing a solution to it all anything like as straightforward? No, is the short answer.

The time aspect can be criticised of course: quite why it took upwards of five hours to confirm what seemed a fairly clear decision regarding a breach that the stewards knew about during the race isn't obvious (the most probable explanation was Red Bull arguing). But beyond that what can be done?

At the most fundamental level F1 must have rules (as any sport must), the rule book must be enforced and breaches must have their consequences. To not have these would amount to anarchy. And F1 unlike a lot of sports has regulations both sporting and technical, adding a layer of (often considerable) complexity.

Australian GP Report: New dawn

In recent weeks and months we've all had our say on the 2014-spec Formula One. Consensus has been hard to find, but one aspect wherein there has been close to unanimity was that a lot would vary from what had gone before. New chassis, new engines (check that, power units - even the name is new), new regulations - especially on fuel restrictions - that threatened to usher in a form F1 racing not as we have known it, new drivers, plenty of new combinations. In short, for the Australian Grand Prix today much was new. And broadly it turned out to be refreshingly so.

Nico Rosberg took an imperious win
Photo: Octane Photography

Change isn't necessarily good of course, and plenty aired trepidation in advance. One swallow doesn't make a summer either, and with any new formula we should wait a few races for matters to settle before we draw firm conclusions. But today in our first demonstration of it all at the very least most of the predictions at the doom-mongering end of the spectrum didn't come to pass. Fifteen cars were still circulating at the end; 14 classified; only five stopped due to technical woes. The race wasn't to outward eyes a conspicuous fuel economy run - it was helped by a safety car and an added formation lap, but this race is in the top three on the calendar for fuel thirstiness. Once again, the almost superhuman ability of the sport's fraternity to overcome grand challenge and do so in an implausible timescale was on show.

Ten of the Greatest Drivers in F1 - a guest post by Maria Mcquire

Formula One is probably the most well-known and popular car race in the entire world. This series started in 1950; it is an international car race from the category of single seaters where 22 drivers and 11 teams compete for the fabulous trophies. There have been many great and fantastic F1 drivers since the start, but only a few can be the best. Here are a few details of some of the best F1 car drivers ever…

Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost (and Thierry Boutsen)
after the 1988 Canadian Grand Prix
Credit: Angelo Orsi / CC

Ayrton Senna: He was a brilliant, ruthless, determined, fast and fascinating racer that Formula One has never seen the like of before or since. He himself accompanied a more professional approach to fitness and dedication to the sport. He was unquestionably the best driver ever in wet weather conditions. One only has to remember Donington in 1993 where Ayrton went from fifth to first before the end of the first lap!

Michael Schumacher: The unfashionable driver of F1, Michael Schumacher, considered as one the best F1 drivers by his constant wins, you either like or dislike. He won five titles with Ferrari during his time, in a seven-time world champion career.

Further thoughts on the Indian Grand Prix

Doughnuts all round
It seems appropriate for us to end this round of Further Thoughts... with Sebastian Vettel. We know by now that he isn't everyone's cup of tea, but surely even those with the iciest views of young Seb will have had them thawed at least a little by the sight of him cutting loose after taking the flag last Sunday and with it his latest championship crown. As has been replayed seemingly without end since, rather than return to parc ferme as is the standard tepid way he instead indulged in doughnuts on the pit straight in front of the packed and roaring grandstand, then bowed in front of the car in worship, before climbing the spectator fence and - redolent of Nigel Mansell - throwing his gloves into the crowd. It was a fantastic and, apparently, spontaneous display of emotion from Vettel, him showing simple child-like joy and desire for everyone to share the moment with him. Everyone loved it.

Surely not even the most vociferous Seb-baiter
will not have appreciated his Indian post race celebrations
Photo: Octane Photography

Well, everyone apart from the stewards, who (predictably) handed a reprimand to Seb for not returning straight to parc ferme after the race, as well as fined the Red Bull team for not instructing its charge so to do. The reaction to this was predictable too: for example 'Vettel fined for celebrating' was a headline I saw on the front of a national newspaper the next morning (quite impressive that they managed to get two things wrong in a four-word headline). But still, it can't be denied that the sanction being applied didn't come across well.

The stewards simply were applying the rules as they are, and as they've been applied in the past, so ill-will towards them is harsh. I'm also always rather loath to seek to resolve such situations by calling for 'common sense' to be applied, as I don't think such a call is especially helpful, given someone's interpretation of common sense is - despite its title - usually subjective, ill-defined as well as its usage often results in gross inconsistency of rules' application, which would also be bound to get people's backs up. And in almost every such case of F1 stewards enforcing an apparently bad rule one finds after a little investigation that, in spite of initial appearances, the rule actually exists for a good reason.

Further thoughts on the Singapore Grand Prix

No sympathy for Mark Webber
I suppose it shows the importance of getting the whole picture.

Like rather a lot of people, when I first heard that Mark Webber would get a grid drop of ten places for the forthcoming Korean Grand Prix - as a consequence of his getting a 'taxi ride' back to the pits on Fernando Alonso's Ferrari on the slowing down lap of Sunday's Singapore Grand Prix - I thought it was the latest instance of Formula One making a thorough idiot of itself. Senna and Mansell in Silverstone 1991, folklore, and all that.

But the headline was deceptive; get beyond it and it all begins to make sense. It's a demonstration that the stewards don't always get it wrong.

Mark Webber (centre) and Fernando
Alonso (left): bang to rights
Photo: Octane Photography

For one thing, despite the claims to the contrary the grid drop penalty was not just for this. It was a result of the new rule that means an accumulation of three reprimands in a season equals a grid drop (just as in 1997 when many missed that Jacques Villeneuve's disqualification from the Japanese Grand Prix - which oh-so nearly altered the destination of that year's world championship - was a result of accumulated offences and not the single offence committed at Suzuka). And when Webber got his second reprimand of the campaign in Canada earlier this year it was reported widely that this left him with no more leeway (see, for example here). So Webber had no excuse for not making a point of being whiter than white, purer than pure.

Further thoughts on the Japanese Grand Prix

Gloves off

The only threat to Sebastian Vettel in Suzuka
came from off the track
Credit: Ryan Bayona / CC

Sebastian Vettel was untouchable in Suzuka, and was so from an early point of the weekend. But on Saturday afternoon about the only threat to his supremacy of the whole meeting emerged, and it came not from the track but from the stewards' room.

Ferrari and Fernando Alonso reckoned that Seb had blocked Alonso at the chicane in the latter's one and only flying lap in the final qualifying session, and estimated they'd lost a tenth of a second or two as a consequence. For some three hours after the qualifying session finished the result was in suspended animation, as all waited to see whether Seb's pole would stand. Eventually the stewards confirmed that yes, Seb had done wrong, but a reprimand was the only punishment.

Ferrari to some extent had a point, in that from a still shot I saw of the 'incident’ it appeared to fall under the category of the sort of thing punished these days (Seb looks to be on the racing line under braking for the chicane, with Alonso off it). And while no two blocking cases are the same, it seemed odd that Jean-Eric Vergne got a three-place drop for an offence under the same broad category in the same qualifying hour by the same set of stewards. Though, as Tony Dodgins pointed out, the stewards have been that way all season when dealing with blocking: some offences have got a five-place grid drop, some three, some just a telling off.

It's time to stop the block

The guys who finished in the top three at Monza last weekend have barely had a look in. Much of the comment about the race since has concerned the guys that came fourth and fifth: Lewis Hamilton and Michael Schumacher. Most pertinently, it concerned Schumacher's tactics in defending his place from Lewis Hamilton, a battle that lasted for half the race.

Schumi's extreme pushing of the boundaries of acceptability when defending is well-established, and as it was, not for the first time, he escaped serious punishment at Monza. This was an outcome that split F1 fans pretty much down the middle, between the 'it's racing, it's entertaining, let them get on with it' group in one corner and the 'it was dangerous and clearly outside the rules' in the other.

Michael Schumacher has again been in the news
Credit: Alex Comerford / CC

In my view it's beyond doubt that, given the rules, Schumi should have received some censure for his tactics. The battle certainly provided entertainment, much of Schumi's defence of positioning his car on the inside line was, given the regs are as they are, in the 'hard but fair' category, and he was greatly assisted his his car's prodigious straightline speed. But even so some of Schumacher's moves in defending his place went beyond what the regulations say are acceptable.

Just as a reminder, article 20.2 of the sporting regulations states: 'Manoeuvres liable to hinder other drivers, such as more than one change of direction to defend a position, deliberate crowding of a car beyond the edge of the track or any other abnormal change of direction, are not permitted.' Schumacher, most notably, moved twice in defending his place ahead of Hamilton on lap 20 approaching the first Lesmo, right to the inside of the track and immediately right back to the racing line to take his apex. He did something similar, though less extreme, on laps 10, 11, 13, 15 and 21 on the run down to the Ascari complex. And of course he edged Hamilton off the track at Curve Grande on lap 16, which looked both dangerous in itself and an example of 'crowding of a car beyond the edge of the track'. Indeed, he was warned more than once by race control for his driving, the first time was even before the worst case on lap 20, and it transpires that he in all probability would have received a penalty for the lap 20 move had the stewards' attention not been elsewhere at that point (something subsequently admitted by driver steward Derek Daly - Daly talks in detail and with commendable frankness on his stewarding at Monza on The Flying Lap below).


Episode 36: Italian De-brief with Derek and Conor Daly from Smibs TV on Vimeo.
But the discussion got me thinking more widely about what should be considered acceptable in F1 when defending your position from a competitor in a race.

Stewards continue to baffle

A bit more musing on the Spa race.

You may recall Martin Brundle mentioning in the BBC commentary, as the cars were poised on the starting grid waiting for the green light, that Felipe Massa had overshot his starting slot by a couple of metres.

Well, what do you know, amateur footage has appeared on You Tube (better move quickly before Bernie twigs). Felipe looks bang to rights.

While I'm generally a fan of stewards butting out, it does seem odd that this wasn't even investigated, let alone punished. Even some kind of warning or fine to ensure no one would seek to use this sort of stunt as an advantage in future (as with Hamilton setting his fastest qualifying lap on fumes in Canada, and thus running out of fuel before getting back to the pits) would have been something.