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The 2021 F1 Season.

That sounds like a can of worms.

Some cap relief for the injured party if they are not at fault might work though, although that would go against the point of reducing the budgets.
 
Trying to charge a guilty party for crash damage would result in the longest court cases the world has known.

Hey. For more relevance to road cars (yawn) how about they have insurance?
 
markvdv said:
Binotto declared that crashrepairs should be paid by driver's team that is declared guilty of the crash and should not be exempt of the budgetcap. Mercedes would be in trouble that way after 2 races with judgement errors causing huge damages to other teams cars. What is the penalty for exceeding budgetcap?
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I cannot see that working. The pressure on the stewards will be increased massively. There will be attempts at legal redress. Motor racing is dangerous and drivers do need to be able push the limits and this would make them more cautious.

I do not know what the penalties are, but if they are anything like the last attempt at a budget cap (2010) then they were ignored by some teams and it all fell apart very quickly.

Fortunately, Nigel Kerr, who was the CFO at Brawn F1 and Merc F1, has helped develop the current rules and penalties and so with all his experience, and not being in a team, will hopefully have developed a more robust system.
 
markvdv said:
Binotto declared that crashrepairs should be paid by driver's team that is declared guilty of the crash and should not be exempt of the budgetcap. Mercedes would be in trouble that way after 2 races with judgement errors causing huge damages to other teams cars. What is the penalty for exceeding budgetcap?
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Sounds slightly bananas to me - given the nature of motor racing, crashes are an inevitable part of drivers seeking an advantage, and judgement calls at those sorts of speeds aren't necessarily going to be the right ones. Now if it had been deliberate à la Ayrton Senna or Michael Schumacher, that's another thing, but that certainly wasn't the case here. Given that reaction and the reactions of Red Bull last time out, where have all the adults in the sport gone?
 
IanW said:
I don't know.

Mattia Binotto is Swiss and so may have a different legal background to Ferrari?
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If it had happened on Italian soil, things might have been different - every time he went to Italy after the 1961 Monza crash that killed Wolfgang von Trips and 12 spectators, Jim Clark was dragged in by the police for another interrogation. Williams had similar problems in the aftermath of Senna's fatal crash and the alleged sheared steering column. Thankfully this coming-together didn't happen in Italy and the only things injured were people's pride and teams' wallets.

Somewhat ironic that Ferrari should complain; Enzo Ferrari was notably careless of his drivers' lives and seemed to regard their deaths as just part of the sport he loved. People would comment that perhaps red was a particularly appropriate colour for a Ferrari.
 
One thing grips my crap about the Italians. Kubica’s awful rally crash… why was nobody held to account for allowing that stage to go ahead with the rough end of some Armco sitting there waiting for someone to lose control, which happens all the time in rallying? Or would that mean Italy taking Italy to court and that wouldn’t suit them?
 
This was in Autosport yesterday, with reference to why Lewis went to the grid on Sunday

“His Mercedes team had been worried that, with the team having the first box in the pitlane, coming in to swap tyres would have left Hamilton trapped after the tyre change and unable to get back out until the whole field had gone through.

While he would have regained some spots as others ahead of him would subsequently have had to wait, the fear was that he would still be dropped well into the midfield pack. It's why the team took the gamble on sticking with the inters.”

From Autosport
 
Tony Lockhart said:
This was in Autosport yesterday, with reference to why Lewis went to the grid on Sunday

“His Mercedes team had been worried that, with the team having the first box in the pitlane, coming in to swap tyres would have left Hamilton trapped after the tyre change and unable to get back out until the whole field had gone through.

While he would have regained some spots as others ahead of him would subsequently have had to wait, the fear was that he would still be dropped well into the midfield pack. It's why the team took the gamble on sticking with the inters.”

From Autosport
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Indeed glad to see Mercedes agreeing with my analysis :D

cutting42 said:
Just caught up with the race, blinking flip that was dramatic.

I do wonder what would have happened if HAM had pitted, I am pretty sure a few might have stayed out but equally as the Merc pit is right at the start of the pit lane would he have ended up near the back anyway as he would not have been released after a stop until all the cars had trundled past.

Probably better than dead last but who knows.
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Merc race strategy spinning.

Soon after the race Toto said they did absolutely the right thing with Lewis not pitting with everyone else.

Then the doubt crept in (more likely they realised how stupid the original statement sounded) and since then their have been various levels of admitting it was a mistake to it not really having that much affect on the race outcome.

One of their predictions that they have made public said that Lewis would have ended up between 6th and 10th. Difficult to see Lewis not winning from there! Whereas winning from last, whilst possible, had far greater risk and was considerably less likely.

I checked with a race strategy expert and he said that there was no doubt in his mind at the time or after the event, that Lewis pitting was the obvious action to take with him staying out only having negative consequences.
 
IanW said:
Merc race strategy spinning.

Soon after the race Toto said they did absolutely the right thing with Lewis not pitting with everyone else.

Then the doubt crept in (more likely they realised how stupid the original statement sounded) and since then their have been various levels of admitting it was a mistake to it not really having that much affect on the race outcome.

One of their predictions that they have made public said that Lewis would have ended up between 6th and 10th. Difficult to see Lewis not winning from there! Whereas winning from last, whilst possible, had far greater risk and was considerably less likely.

I checked with a race strategy expert and he said that there was no doubt in his mind at the time or after the event, that Lewis pitting was the obvious action to take with him staying out only having negative consequences.
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Completely agree and Lewis (who rarely, if ever, criticises the team in public) got as close as he dared to saying the same thing. It was blindingly obvious!
 
Tony Lockhart said:
More safety concerns, this time for Spa after two drivers were hospitalised after this crash

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Spa and in particular that area of the track, is very difficult to make much safer as there is no additional space to the side to use to reduce the impact speed or allow the cars more space.

I would need to see what caused the crash, which was further down the hill, to have a better idea as to whether other changes but could be made to make racing there safer.
 
IanW said:
Spa and in particular that area of the track, is very difficult to make much safer as there is no additional space to the side to use to reduce the impact speed or allow the cars more space.

I would need to see what caused the crash, which was further down the hill, to have a better idea as to whether other changes but could be made to make racing there safer.
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To me, and this hurts to say, race cars are too heavy and far too fast now. The energy a GT car carries is huge, and when a car is fully loaded through somewhere like Eau Rouge and that rise, a failure or mistake will have nasty consequences. We’ve had a death there in the last couple of years, so something needs to be done. Driving your 1.25 tonne car into a stationary crippled car ain’t gonna end well.
 
The problem is Eau Rouge and Raidillon is so iconic it cannot really be changed. I still remember the sense of pride the first time I took it flat with no lift.

in the sim
 
Tony Lockhart said:
To me, and this hurts to say, race cars are too heavy and far too fast now. The energy a GT car carries is huge, and when a car is fully loaded through somewhere like Eau Rouge and that rise, a failure or mistake will have nasty consequences. We’ve had a death there in the last couple of years, so something needs to be done. Driving your 1.25 tonne car into a stationary crippled car ain’t gonna end well.
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I agree that the large mass is a big contributory factor to the severity of the accident.

But Antoine Hubert's death and Juan Manuel Correa's very serious injuries show that even with lightweight F2 cars it is a dangerous place to race.

In an F1 car a lot of the additional mass that has been added over the years is there for safety reasons, but I would prefer to see lighter F1 cars (make the powerplant lighter and less powerful to balance this) to make them more manoeuvrable.
 
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