How the FIA getting certain F1 rule tweaks right highlights other needed changes

Well, that was inevitable. Just three races into the 2023 Formula 1 season, following three crushing Red Bull victories, the first blows are starting to land against its penalty for breaking the 2021 cost cap.

“It was not a penalty,” Fred Vassuer said after the Melbourne race, with the Ferrari team principal, adding: “I am not trying to find excuse at all – [Red Bull did a good job with its car design so] it's not this – but if you ask me if the penalty is too light, I say yes.”

The reverse was just as likely. That, if Red Bull had lost the clear edge with which it ended 2022 and it was Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso scooping up victories ahead of Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez, then the regular Christian Horner slot on Sky Sports F1’s grand prix programmes would’ve been repeatedly dedicated to denouncing the penalty as too harsh.

Because this is surely just the start. Come the next round in Baku and other F1 team leaders and drivers will be asked if they agree with Vasseur’s assessment, if not outright stating it themselves unprompted. The anti-Red Bull conspiracy episode of next season’s Drive to Survive just writes itself…

But while these stories stop the media glare getting any hotter on Ferrari and other underachieving squads in 2023, it has a knock-on effect for the other big player in the cost cap saga. That is, as the financial rules regulator, the FIA.

And it’s a similar story for the governing body. That it remains negatively in the headlines and subject to ongoing criticism from F1’s fanbase, particularly its more partisan elements. Because, really, there hasn’t been a moment this year where the FIA hasn’t been under scrutiny in some way.

Vasseur has voiced criticism over Red Bull's cost cap penalty, but the FIA was set to face criticism either way

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

At the start of 2023 there were series of controversies involving FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem before he stepped back from overseeing day-to-day F1 matters, which were followed by the interest in the impact of the required rule changes for the 2023 F1 car designs.

In Jeddah, there was the furore over Alonso’s pitstop penalty, plus in both of the two opening rounds there was the decision to penalise drivers for lining up too far to one side of their grid boxes following a change on this matter in F1’s sporting rules. This led to those being widened in Australia – along with an experiment using central guide lines that won’t be reoccurring elsewhere in such a form at the front of the box – where Autosport revealed the full extent to how the FIA is now restricting teams' staff celebrating on pitwalls at race climaxes.

The reaction to all these sagas was as predictable as Red Bull’s rivals criticising its cost cap penalty. That the FIA is the ‘fun police’ over certain decisions, ‘incompetent’ over others.

This rather reflects the age we live in. Where distrust in authorities rages through society having been inflamed by nefarious politicians or following disgusting abuse of power by those who wield it. And in an F1-specific way, for many the FIA has not and may never be forgiven for the Abu Dhabi 2021 officiating shambles.

The move to stop team members climbing pitwall debris fences does remove an “iconic” F1 image, per Horner, but it’s a small price to pay considering the possibility of a person plunging onto the track with cars approaching at top speed

There are two important elements to reflect on in this regard; the first is that the FIA is doing plenty right, for which it appears to get a disproportionate amount of vitriolic criticism in response.

Under this bracket falls the move to increase driver safety regarding wearing jewellery and correct underwear kit – kicked off in Melbourne last year and still rumbling on with every pre-FP1 stewards bulletin now stating that Lewis Hamilton’s piercings form inaccurate ‘self-scrutineering’ from Mercedes by being left in, but then that he has been granted a medical exemption on the matter.

The move to stop team members climbing pitwall debris fences does remove an “iconic” F1 image, per Horner, but it’s a small price to pay considering the possibility of a person plunging onto the track with cars approaching at top speed. This was a real fear from within the FIA regarding the strength of the angled top edges of pitwall fences installed at many tracks to deflect debris, following so many Red Bull and Aston staff celebrating upon them in Jeddah.

The teams, ultimately, accept this development, with Grand Prix Drivers’ Association director George Russell saying in Melbourne: “Initially, when I read that, I was a little disappointed, because I think that's part of the sport.

The FIA has moved to stop F1 team members climbing the pit fences at race finishes - a sensible measure criticised by some as it being 'fun police'

Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

“Then I heard it's only about climbing the fences – they can still stand on the pitwall. I think some of the older circuits we go to, we stand on those fences [and] they do wobble. If you've got 20, 30 big guys on there – I know, we've got some big boys in our team [at Mercedes] – you'd never want to see something like that happen.

“So yeah, I guess it's a shame in some ways but if we saw something like that fall in when the cars are passing that'd be pretty horrific.”

But that acceptance is shrouded in many quarters by frustration, which is the second element to reflect on. As one F1 team member put it in the Melbourne paddock: “That’s all fine, but there are still too many silly arguments over the rules”.

This is an overarching feeling and covers both the FIA’s problems with image and regulation rulings. The latter was summed up best by the Alonso Jeddah penalty saga, where an uncodified understanding that front jacks could touch a car and not be considered pitstop ‘working’ sat alongside the rule as written, and so Aston was able to argue it should apply for the rear jack too given what teams had already verbally agreed. For Melbourne this rule was tightened, and jacks now definitely cannot touch a car before a penalty is served.

Such situations feed into an FIA image issue, which was also highlighted by that Alonso case, as his initial second penalty came late enough to mean the podium scenes F1 fans had just watched were undermined as he was briefly demoted behind Russell in the results.

That delay was followed by Carlos Sainz being slapped with a penalty – now upheld – for punting Alonso around at the controversial Melbourne restart without being able to argue his case. This gives rise to accurate complaints regarding the consistency of such judgement’s procedures, but in that case his testimony wasn’t deemed relevant by the event’s stewards, who had already established Sainz was "wholly to blame for the collision".

It never seems to stop for the FIA in the current climate. Holding those in power to account is vital, but it could also surely help itself in so many of these matters. For example, the confusion over the restart order for what followed that third standing start in Australia and Sainz’s blunder – along with those of Pierre Gasly, Perez and Logan Sargeant.

The Alonso penalty U-turn in Jeddah was an example of the FIA tying itself in knots over penalties

Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

Many, including a raging Alonso from his Aston cockpit, recalled back to how the FIA had established the restart order for the 2022 British GP during its early stoppage. Like at Silverstone, the FIA used the last point it could reasonably establish the order and built it around that in Melbourne. But there was a long period of confusion where the team managers put forward their positions for consideration (off-air, of course) and the decision was communicated to other officials and the teams.

Perhaps to aid scenes like this, which are surely set to be repeated, the FIA could establish an annual off-season competition commission ceremony, where rule changes or complex decision processes such as these are explained fully and scrutinised publicly – taking inspiration from other sporting machinations.

Sometimes more time is needed for the right outcome to be reached. Sometimes more evidence on a matter comes to light and so the correct conclusion is established eventually via appeals and review requests. And if the FIA opened up even more than the steps it has correctly taken in recent seasons (think the quicker updates on situations such as why red flags are required and the thorough investigation into the Suzuka 2022 tractor incidents) it would ease additional concerns about its justice processes.

Motorsport fans love more insight – and that would surely come if additional FIA explanations were offered, alongside the ongoing need to re-establish regular media briefings from race direction officials

These have also been in the headlines after Felipe Massa stated he is looking into whether there are grounds to mount a legal case against the outcome of the 2008 world championship, over perhaps how much F1 and the FIA did or didn’t know about the Singapore Crashgate scandal before that title was officially signed off as Hamilton’s.

A similar situation applies to Abu Dhabi 2021 too, in that Mercedes withdrew its challenges over that race as it felt the FIA’s International Court of Appeal wouldn’t find against what had occurred. That, although the ICA is an independent structure, the FIA was in effect marking its own homework, to paraphrase Toto Wolff.

Motorsport fans love more insight – and that would surely come if additional FIA explanations were offered, alongside the ongoing need to re-establish regular media briefings from race direction officials.

Plus, it would surely help that trust problem too. Because reasonable people understand that this is an incredibly complex motorsport division where the relatively simple outcomes witnessed in other sports that feed our instant gratification culture can’t always be replicated.

Should the FIA be more open to making its officials available to scrutiny?

Photo by: Lionel Ng / Motorsport Images