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SC rules unlikely to be changed soon

Safety car regulations look unlikely to be changed in the near future despite teams continuing calls for a swift shake-up to the current rules

Several teams and drivers have expressed concerns at how the closure of the pits at certain times when the safety car is out can penalise them unfairly.

The rules cost McLaren's Heikki Kovalainen a podium finish in Australia, and Nick Heidfeld lost any chance of a points finish in Spain last Sunday when he was forced to pit when the pitlane was closed in order not to run out of fuel.

That led to further calls from BMW motorsport boss Mario Theissen to change the rules quickly.

"It's a lottery, you cannot plan for it. You put up your strategy before the race and you can only hope it doesn't happen," Theissen said after the race.

Discussions have already taken place with the FIA about the possible changes, and drivers were scheduled to meet race director Charlie Whiting at the Spanish Grand Prix to discuss an overhaul.

But despite that, Red Bull driver Mark Webber said a quick change is unlikely.

"It's under discussion but it's still a few races away at least," said Webber. "Maybe for Monaco and Canada - because there's a lot of shunts there. As we've said before, everybody would like it tidied up; drivers, team management and the FIA."

Ferrari's team principal Stefano Domenicali was less optimistic and said the change may not come until next season.

"Well, I think that realistically speaking I don't know if this will be possible to be changed before the end of the season," Domenicali admitted.

"For sure it's under discussion in the next SWG, it's on the agenda, so it's something that we want to work out because for sure it's very unlucky if you get in that situation but this could happen to everyone.

"Don't forget that a safety car in a normal way can be very unlucky so we need to stay cool and think what is the best option for everyone before changing something. The worst thing that we can do in Formula One now is to make a change and then suddenly realise that we've changed it for the worse and then you get lost.

"Before you do something, it's better to think ten times."

Williams's technical director Sam Michael said the Sporting Working Group had continued discussions about the possible changes, but the Briton admitted he is not expecting any.

"That got discussed at the SWG a couple of days ago, Wednesday I think, and there is no change on that," said Michael. "I would be surprised if it is changed.

"Basically it has come up again now because some people have been affected recently. In Montreal last year McLaren and Williams were the first people to get nailed with the SC rules, with Rosberg and Alonso, and did anyone care then except for Williams and McLaren?

"Frank (Williams) made a big fuss then and I don't know if Ron said anything or not, but no one is interested in changing it.

"That is why McLaren pitted early last year to make sure they avoided the situation. On average it is going to be the same for everyone. Toro Rosso probably liked it in Melbourne, although Bourdais stopped for a reliability issue he was in fourth place before that.

"My opinion is we should stay exactly as we are, or go back to what we had before. I personally as an engineer liked what we had before, but I recognise it was potentially dangerous because there was an incentive to drive fast through the accident.

"But as an engineer in the pitlane it was really good as you could duck and dive, and take advantage. If you were very quick thinking and think fast on your feet you could make big gains from it."

Force India's technical chief Mike Gascoyne reckons the current rules are not fair and says a change is needed quickly.

"I think it all takes too long now," said Gascoyne. "But having said that, I think they were right to do what they did to stop people driving too quickly and rushing into the pits.

"Maybe on reflection, you could probably solve the driving too quickly by implementing a sector time restriction - if you're 120 per cent of today's quickest sector time - but then you'd still have the problem of restarts.

"If they do it quite quickly, it could still work - but if it takes three or four laps and you were due to stop the next lap, you've got to come in and incur a penalty.

"And that's a massive downfall for absolutely no fault of your own: you could be leading the race by a minute and drop to last through no fault of your own because you get a stop-go penalty and end up last and you've done absolutely nothing wrong other than just be unlucky when the Safety Car comes up. And that's got to be addressed"

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