F1's most powerful safety car

The appearance of the Safety Car elicits a range of emotions, all tempered by the gravity of the circumstances that prompted its deployment. From a fan perspective, it can suddenly create excitement in an otherwise processional race. Likewise, it's a pleasing opportunity for drivers further down the field to gain positions as the whole pack is artificially bunched up.

On the flip side, the race leader will be crestfallen at the sight of yellow flashing lights and SC boards, especially if they've pushed hard to build a gap to their opposition. With that precious margin gone, and tyre temperatures dropping with every lap spent behind the Safety Car, the prospect of a restart on cold tyres and brakes puts them on edge. It's at those moments you can understand why a frustrated Lewis Hamilton or Sebastian Vettel cries out: "The Safety Car is too slow!"

But 'slow' is a relative term. For the past 18 years Bernd Maylander has driven the wheels off an evolving cast of Mercedes high-performance road cars, while pacing the field as safely as he can. This year his job has been made easier, thanks to the brand-new AMG GT R that has replaced the GT S. With 585bhp and a top speed of 198mph, this is the most powerful and fastest Safety Car since Mercedes officially started supplying vehicles for F1 in 1996, and closer to the performance envelope of the racing cars it's keeping in check.

With sophisticated active aerodynamics, four-wheel steering, a 4.0-litre V8 biturbo front-mid-engine and improved suspension, the GT R is capable of doing 0-62mph in 3.6 seconds.

"I'm much more comfortable on the limit," says stalwart Safety Car driver Maylander. "It's definitely a step up from the GT S, which was already a quick car. With the four-wheel system you can feel the rear-axle steering, which immediately makes the car more direct, and it also has nine levels of traction control. The car is wider, there's more grip, and while the top speed isn't massively increased, maybe two or three miles per hour, we're now much quicker in cornering."

Maylander first got his hands on the new car in winter testing (yes, even the new Safety Car has to be put through its paces before the season begins) at the Nardo Ring research facility in southern Italy. "We were immediately four to five seconds quicker and the weather conditions weren't as good as they've been in the past, so we knew that it was a decent improvement," he recalls. "You get good feedback from this car; it tells you - in a nice way - if you're about to overdrive it. There's a gap before you get to the limit."

According to Maylander, the Safety Car is between eight and ten seconds slower than a Formula 1 car over one kilometre; for 2018, the new GT R is a second quicker per kilometre than its predecessor. That will translate to being seven seconds a lap quicker at long circuits such as Spa. The question is whether that will be speedy enough for Hamilton, Vettel et al...

"I've raced myself, and I attend all the FIA drivers' briefings on a Friday evening at GPs," says Bernd. "I hear what they all say: 'Why is the Safety Car so slow?' But you have to remember that it is a safety car - it is meant to slow the speed of the field. You don't want another racing car at the head of the pack.

"Drivers at the front complain because they don't want their lead taken away. I understand that, but it's not as though we can put slick tyres on the GT R and drive faster. If we're out on track, on slicks, and it starts to rain, then the Safety Car will have to pit to change tyres... and we can't have this scenario."

Drivers will zigzag behind the Safety Car, occasionally braking hard, then you'll see a burst of acceleration as they try to put energy through their tyres and brakes. It's a frustrating time for everyone, but that soon dissipates as the excitement ratchets up a notch in anticipation of the race resuming.

Since 1996, each Safety Car model used has always been the quickest in the Mercedes road-car range and the GT R is a continuation of that policy. Even if once that happened to be Maylander's actual road car.

"The C63 was the quickest AMG car when they first started supplying F1," he remembers. "It was 300bhp with a fully automatic gearbox and it was my first company car. AMG took it off me, put some lights on the roof and it became the Safety Car..."

Drivers shouldn't need to complain about the current AMG GT R model's speed. If they do, they should think back to how slow Safety Cars used to be...