Exclusive: Why the FIA has closed formation lap and damaged car loopholes for F1 2025

The FIA has made a raft of changes to Formula 1’s sporting rules for the 2025 season, with two loopholes concerning formation laps and damaged cars the most notable alterations.

Article 43.8 of F1’s sporting rules has been changed to state “all cars starting from the pitlane able to do so must leave the pitlane and join the formation lap”.

Previously, such cars would only leave their garages when the grid was finally forming up and not take part in the formation lap.

Now, once the formation lap has been completed including the pitlane starters, these will re-enter the pits and line up in qualifying order, unless they first form up after the five-minute signal pre-race start – in which case they must join the back of any queue that heads out for the formation lap at the back of the pack.

Autosport understands that by changing this rule, the FIA has closed several possible loopholes the teams could have exploited under the old regulations.

The first is that, under the 2024 wording of this rule, pitlane starters could join an extra formation lap or formation laps held behind the safety car (say, in very wet conditions) if they desired, but in the case of multiple cars being in this scenario some could choose not to do so and therefore automatically gain places when the others returned to the pitlane for the start.

Valtteri Bottas, Stake F1 Team Kick Sauber C44, waits for the green light at the pit lane exit

Photo by: Andrew Ferraro / Motorsport Images

Previously, in the event of an aborted start and an extra formation lap, cars starting from the pitlane could also automatically gain an extra lap of fuel to use even with the race distance reduced by one lap.

And in the event of a wet race starting with safety car laps, a pitlane starter could in theory wait for conditions to improve and then head straight out onto intermediate tyres when racing commenced, while their already-circulating rivals would have to pit at the end of the first racing lap to switch off the extreme wets mandated in such situations.

With all three of these loopholes in mind, the FIA is understood to have taken the option to now require all pitlane starters to complete all formation laps before returning to the pitlane in every start circumstance.

Damaged cars ordered to stop

The other loophole the FIA has closed for 2025 concerns what happens when a driver tries to bring a damaged car back to the pitlane after an incident.

Although sources from within the FIA insist the thrust behind this change does not come from any specific incident in 2024, and instead is the result of thinking going back several seasons, there is an illustrative example from last year involving ex-Red Bull driver Sergio Perez.

During last year’s Canadian Grand Prix, Perez crashed solo after switching for slicks and then brought his car back to the pitlane with a smashed rear wing – dropping debris onto the track as he did so.

Perez was subsequently given a three-place grid penalty for the 2024 Spanish Grand Prix, with Red Bull fined €25,000 for confirming his decision.

Sergio Perez, Red Bull Racing RB20

Photo by: Francois Tremblay / Motorsport Images

The Montreal stewards felt this was all done to avoid causing a safety car activation that might have hurt eventual race winner Max Verstappen in the other RB20.

Now, changes to Article 26.10 mean F1 race director Rui Marques will be able to order a team to stop its car immediately in such circumstances.

But it is not yet clear if Marques will communicate directly with a driver as occurs in some other categories or instead get the message relayed via their race engineer.

The rule now states: “Any driver whose car has significant and obvious damage to a structural component which results in it being in a condition presenting an immediate risk of endangering the driver or others, or whose car has a significant failure or fault which means it cannot reasonably return to the pitlane without unnecessarily impeding another competitor or otherwise hindering the competition, must leave the track as soon as it is safe to do so.

“At the sole discretion of the race director, should a car be deemed to have such significant and obvious damage to a structural component, or such significant failure or fault, the competitor may be instructed that the car must leave the track as soon as it is safe to do so.”

Essentially, this means a much quicker implementation of the black-flag-with-an-orange disc rule that usually requires damaged cars to return to the pits for repairs.

This has been contentious since the 2022 season following a series of incidents involving lightly damaged cars continuing racing – after which the FIA opted to reduce the warning flag’s use.

Autosport understands that the reason for changing this rule for 2025 stems from the previous text being considered too generic and difficult for both teams and race event stewards to interpret.