McLaren team principal Andrea Stella says that his team were prepared to challenge the stewards had Lando Norris lost his pole-winning lap in sprint qualifying.
Norris secured his second consecutive sprint race pole position at Shanghai in a rain-affected qualifying session on Friday.The third and final phase of sprint qualifying took place in wet conditions after rain started falling at the end of SQ2. Several drivers went off track around the wet circuit, including Charles Leclerc – who spun lightly into the barriers – Max Verstappen and Oscar Piastri among others.
Norris ran wide at the final corner on his penultimate timed lap, ending up with his outside wheels in the gravel trap. Due to running wide, Norris’s lap was deleted by the stewards. However, as the infraction had occurred at the final corner, his following lap was also deleted – a regular practice in qualifying and race sessions at many circuits.
While race director Niels Wittich’s event notes issued before each race weekend can outline that drivers will lose subsequent laps when track limits breaches are committed out of the final corner – the most notable example being the Red Bull Ring – there is no such provision for this weekend. Therefore, the stewards had no grounds in which to delete Norris’ lap or any legitimate lap due to a track limits breach out of the final corner on the previous lap.
As a result, the stewards reinstated Norris’s quickest lap time, which he completed without exceeding track limits. That time secured him pole position by over a second from Lewis Hamilton
Stella said McLaren would have fought to have Norris’s pole time reinstated had the stewards not done so. “We were ready to battle that decision,” he told the official F1 channel.
“I think maybe that was deleted because Lando, on the previous lap, went off at the last corner. But actually, if you go out at the last corner on the previous lap, then you lose a lot of time in the following lap because you launch at much lower speed.
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“I guess race control realised that themselves and Lando deserves the pole position and it’s good that the lap has been reinstated.”
McLaren had not expected to be as strong around Shanghai than at some of the earlier circuits in the season. Stella believes the result reflects more the conditions than the inherent pace of McLaren’s car this weekend.
“First of all, it’s sprint pole in conditions which obviously were pretty extreme in terms of the low-grip condition in intermediate tyres today,” he said. “You could see drivers going off the track, which is not normal.
“I think this is just the reflection of how low the grip was in these conditions. So I would say, first of all, well done to Lando. He really drove minimising the impact of these conditions, finding his way and, maximising what was available. So well done to Lando.”
Norris’s team mate Oscar Piastri took eighth place, three seconds slower than Norris’s best. However, Stella revealed that Piastri had suffered a gearbox fault during his final push lap.
“A little bit of a shame for Oscar, because he had an issue with a shift out of the hairpin,” he explained. “The gearbox went into neutral, so he lost a lot of time – otherwise we would have had the second McLaren high up in the classification.
“So, so far, so good. We will see in dry conditions how much of our expectations were actually genuine.”
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Nick T.
19th April 2024, 10:06
I was serving Zak cocktail weenies and I hear different.
ben
19th April 2024, 10:12
No. Rules are rules and shouldn’t just be twisted when it suits a specific driver.
The rule doesn’t only apply “if you lose time” it’s simply if you go off. Nothing against Lando at all, but I hope the stewards reverse this and also look at Verstappen as I believe he had the same issue.
Tommy Scragend
19th April 2024, 10:26
It’s not a rule. As it clearly says in the article:
[quote]While race director Niels Wittich’s event notes issued before each race weekend can outline that drivers will lose subsequent laps when track limits breaches are committed out of the final corner – the most notable example being the Red Bull Ring – there is no such provision for this weekend. Therefore, the stewards had no grounds in which to delete Norris’ lap or any legitimate lap due to a track limits breach out of the final corner on the previous lap.[/quote]
David (@nvherman)
19th April 2024, 10:27
Reading the story carefully, it appears that the lap time which was deleted and then reinstated was not the lap the Norris went off on, but the lap afterwards, and that there are no guidance notes this weekend which state that driver must also lose lap following.
Oople
19th April 2024, 11:03
I take it you didn’t read the article properly, huh?
Drop Saudi
19th April 2024, 12:24
He didn’t break a rule, if there was an advantage in going off before the timed lap, everyone should have been doing it.
Kris
19th April 2024, 10:19
The article is a bit weird as it talks about maybe the lap was reinstated due to not gaining an advantage…
Then covers the race event notes which do not have the “next lap deleted” rule in force.
The race event notes should surely be the main focus of the article.
bernasaurus (@bernasaurus)
19th April 2024, 10:29
The amount of time and effort devoted to track limits and arguing and stewards and technology and rules and then arguing again, and since F1 is open to trialing new stuff these days. Why not have a race without limit violations at all? Maybe a small marker so nobody tries to just rallycross their way straight thru Maggotts / Becketts.
It was noticeable that the exit of Spoon at Suzuka which I think was meant to be policed clearly wasn’t during the GP and soon everyone took advantage of it. I wasn’t sure why Max was going metres over when he’s miles ahead and risking the stewards issuing 47 retrospective violations on the penultimate lap.
I’m not saying this to defend Lando, rules are rules regardless of whether he gained an advantage or not. I just wouldn’t mind seeing what happens if we try it without rules.
Yellow Baron
19th April 2024, 11:01
It was tried without rules. Pretty much all the time before around 2019. It was never much of an issue before that and rightly so because now all we talk about most weekends is track limits and it’s very boring. If I remember correctly around 2019 some commentators started talking about it more loudly then they start asking the drivers more then it becomes an issue then talk talk talk. Wouldn’t be surprised if it was all contrived by liberty to create more to talk about online. I mean it really was barely if it all mentioned over race weekends prior to around 2019. Heck go see Austria 2003 they just got on with it no nonsense. If the commentators don’t like it so much or the FIA etc then they should just add some gravel bags to their freight. Otherwise focus on what actually matters like better racing tyres
Jere (@jerejj)
19th April 2024, 11:05
Yellow Baron Although a similar level issue to Masi’s time from 2013 onwards.
Nick T.
19th April 2024, 13:45
Yep. Commentators were the beginning of enforcing track limits. It had never been a problem and was completely even for everyone. It was the most pointless change in race direction ever. Whiting died in 2019 and soon after almost every aspect of race direction was a disaster. It’s funny cause some blame the issue on Whiting because he didn’t enforce track limits.
MichaelN
19th April 2024, 14:36
The problem with Whiting was that, as with many other things, he selectively enforced the rules.
Rules should be rules, not tools in the hands of a race director to do with as he please.
Nick T.
20th April 2024, 1:58
I don’t think he was stewarding too, but yes he was inconsistent with some things. But I still vastly prefer him to to F1’s subsequent race directors.
S
19th April 2024, 15:11
Whiting decided which rules were followed and when, entirely at his own discretion – and usually as a result of informally chatting with other people in F1 that week, making consistency non-existent from one GP to the next.
His ‘sometimes, maybe’ approach to F1’s safety aspect in particular was a major contributing factor to the events of the Japanese GP 2014.
Yellow Baron
19th April 2024, 11:04
Also indycar employs no track limits rules. They mentioned before in commentary too. Their race control also has a more no nonsense approach to things which is refreshing. The focus there is more on the racing than the talking and spinning in circles
stefano (@alfa145)
19th April 2024, 11:36
what if you cut the same corner for every lap of a race?
Yellow Baron
20th April 2024, 1:56
They have a pretty no nonsense approach and they get things sorted. They wouldn’t start making offers for example or fumble common sense
grat
20th April 2024, 3:32
At an event (Long Beach, in fact) a few years ago, an IndyCar driver cut the exit of the pit lane in order to gain a wee bit less lap time, and won the race.
Race Control reviewed the incident, and decided that while the driver had indeed cut the pit lane exit, a number of other drivers had done so during the race, without being referred to race control. Therefore, since it would have been unfair to only penalize the winning driver, and it would have been impossible to retroactively apply penalties, the winning driver was not punished.
The next race, a week later, they had transponders installed at the pit lane exit, and anyone cutting the pit lane exit line was instantly penalized.
… and then there was turn 19 at Circuit of the Americas in Austin. It’s a tough corner to get right, and since there was no track limits, everyone drove wherever they liked for the race. Was a bit silly, really. That was the only time IndyCar went to COTA for a race, so I don’t know what change they’d make.
notagrumpyfan
19th April 2024, 13:52
I thought of ovals, which clearly don’t need track limits as the concrete walls and centrifugal forces are helping out.
But based on your last sentence you’re clearly not talking about ovals :P
Yellow Baron
20th April 2024, 1:58
Lol I was trying to think of a way to make the point that they do so, without making it sound like going round a circuit haha
Jere (@jerejj)
19th April 2024, 11:04
Spoon also had lap time invalidations in the race as per the standard all-around approach in place since 2022.
This time, the matter was relevantly about the lack of ‘following lap invalidation’ part.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
19th April 2024, 21:56
@bernasaurus A race with genuinely no track limits would result in no serious attempt to follow the track and the stewards being unable to argue with someone who said doing 56 burnout spins on the start/finish line (or, if these are in different places as happens at some tracks, simply looping those lines). After all, sectors and mini-sectors are technically track limits in themselves. The races would be ridiculously short and quite processional.
S
19th April 2024, 10:34
They always delete both that and the following laptimes when a driver exceeds track limits at the final corner – but not this time.
Ah well, F1 being F1 again.
roadrunner (@roadrunner)
19th April 2024, 16:16
No they don’t. They only do so if announced in the event notes prior to the event.
China isn’t one of them.
Jere (@jerejj)
19th April 2024, 16:54
@roadrunner Indeed & so far since 2022, only Red Bull Ring, Silverstone, Losail, Yas Marina & Bahrain circuits have had the final corner separately specified for following lap invalidation alongside the ongoing one, with Bahrain among this category only this year, though.
Jere (@jerejj)
19th April 2024, 11:06
& rightly so, given the lack of a separate ‘following lap’ reference regarding the last corner.
senproman
19th April 2024, 11:06
Nothing in the event notes said that after an off at the final corner of this event should the subsequent lap time get deleted.
Lando’s lap time shouldn’t have even remotely been considered for deletion.
This is an impactful error, since there’s a chance (haven’t heard from Lewis to confirm/deny though) Lewis backed off / took fewer risks due to being told he was already on pole – in those conditions, could this have made the 1+ seconds difference? Hard to say.
Jere (@jerejj)
19th April 2024, 11:51
Indeed & surprising that invalidation even happened in the first place despite this clear-cut absence of ‘following lap’ reference for the last corner.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
19th April 2024, 21:57
I was also surprised. It’s annoying when the FIA doesn’t check its own regulations before acting.
S
20th April 2024, 3:04
It’s even more annoying when they keep needlessly changing them from event to event.
Either leaving the track is against the rules (gaining an advantage, by the official wording) – or it isn’t. It isn’t a ‘sometimes’ sort of thing.
Matthijs (@matthijs)
19th April 2024, 12:48
I am glad that his lap got reinstated. Common sense should prevail. In my opinion, when you go off-track and you lose a lot of time doing so, track limits should never be applied. Deleting lap times only makes sense when you go off-track and gain an advantage. I would even argue that all the laptimes that were deleted in this session for people slipping off should be reinstated.
Jere (@jerejj)
19th April 2024, 13:42
Ironically, that was my point early into the 2022 season before realizing lap time invalidation will happen regardless of whether an off-track excursion is advantegous or not, & while doing so is redudant in the latter scenario, I still eventually became okay with this generall approach.
notagrumpyfan
19th April 2024, 16:53
Why do people always want to make rules more complex and open to interpretation and debate?
If you go outside the lines, you did not follow the rules and the lap should be invalidated. Ideally this would be automatic and immediate.
Matthijs (@matthijs)
19th April 2024, 20:40
I don’t want to make the rules more complex, on the contrary. I feel it’s very much against the essence of racing to penalise drivers that are driving on the limit and go off in tricky conditions and lose time while doing so. Penalise them is unnescessary ‘bureaucratic’.
notagrumpyfan
19th April 2024, 13:55
What surprised me more (not having read the event notes) that Verstappen’s lap wasn’t invalidated after he went (way) off at the last corner.
Jere (@jerejj)
19th April 2024, 16:55
Stewards simply didn’t make the same error of incorrectly invalidating with him.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
19th April 2024, 21:58
The lap where Verstappen did it got deleted. The lap afterwards was not.
notagrumpyfan
19th April 2024, 22:09
Exactly.
Why did they ‘read the event notes’ when reviewing Verstappen’s excursion, but forgot it when Norris did the same some seconds later!
Jim from US (@jimfromus)
20th April 2024, 0:52
F1 making it up as they go along. Just ignore that NOR beat everyone else by 2 seconds with that lap when saying that didn’t give an advantage.
S
20th April 2024, 3:02
It’s funny, isn’t it…
Norris (and several others) does two laps that get deleted, both around the 2:00 time mark. With his net lap, which would have been automatically invalidated at other events, he suddenly goes more than 2 seconds faster – and almost nobody thinks this is questionable.
I’m still trying to figure out exactly who thought this occasional application of rules was a good idea, or how it wouldn’t lead to exactly this kind of debate and controversy.
The less (and fewer) rules are applied in F1, the more controversial it is.