Everything has been said here already. I was banned for a month for using laughing emojis too much when criticising others points of view, behind some extreme prejudice against me as a user
So, I was denied the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix discussion for what wasn’t a proportionate ban length.
I will make my position clear here; I would’ve been delighted for Hamilton to win the 8th but still happy for verstappen on a personal level if he had won as well. All I wanted was a result with the same kind of integrity we expect from any sport. If RB had outfoxed MCS on strategy, or Max or Lewis beat eachother in a fair contest of driving I would’ve been satisfied to say this is arguably the greatest F1 season we have had. (I would argue other seasons had drivers that were more willing to race wheel to wheel)
My problem with what happened is with Massi more than the rules.
He failed to follow any consistent procedure. At first it appeared to be he was going to afford the race to finish under safety car. He had informed the teams and drivers cars will not unlap themselves.
The teams made their strategy calls in this scenario as it presented itself.
Massi had previously followed the rules by the book a year ago on Germany, going as far as saying that is the rules [he must follow]
It has since come out that teams had discussed the preference to finish races by racing where possible. This is also fair enough.
The problem I have in this Abu Dhabi situation, is Massi changed his mind after strategy calls had been committed to. And he did so after Christian Horner demanded a lap of racing. It was evident from the dynamic of the conversation-what he did and didn’t say-that’s he was taken aback by the demand as if he was subordinate and Ill prepared for a reason, which is incorrect. He should know first and foremost before anyone, what he has to do and what he can and can’t do. Yet he responded as if he was in need of presenting an excuse for not having done something differently. But if he had the intention to do what he did in the first place, and not change his mind, he would have informed teams and drivers to unlap very early on, with intent to restart the race behind the safety car. Therefore not screwing any drivers and teams strategy.
Putting aside the aspect of him changing his mind at the behest of one team principal, the second issue is how he tried to fix what he may have thought was a mistake on his part.
He instructed selectively, cars to unlap themselves. IMO this ruined the race and made it very cheap and unworthy.
The leading car had to overtake backmarkers which had cost him time. Verstappen on the other hand, was given all the advantages you could ever have to basically rig a different result; fresh tyres, backmarkers removed, and starting on the gearbox of the lead car - so all advantage that was earned and won by the lead car had simply vanished by the hand of the race director through misinforming teams what will happen, and making decisions which punished them for following his original intent. He had to go so far to undo his original direction of managing the Latifi crash that he forced himself to actually break an obvious safety car procedure rule with the safety car coming in on the next lap.
He should have restarted the race with max having to overtake 1 backmarker between himself and Hamilton. That in my view, would’ve been a balanced situation. I’m sure he cannot have done that for some reason they can quote. But since he did selectively choose only some cars, why not do this?
With 1 car between Hamilton and Verstappen. It would’ve given some deserved advantage to Hamilton who had to overtake backmarkers before the safety car, and he had the old tyres. Max could’ve made short work of the backmarker and hopefully still had a chance of catching Lewis so we had an open ending.
It’s just a shame how it worked out for the sporting spectacle and integrity of the sport.
In a perfect world, if we had to finish any laps after a safety car period, there would’ve been 3 laps left and about 2 - 3 backmarkers between them.
The RB is faster with lower fuel, fast and fresh C5s which it thrives on, and being right behind a car in front which was on 40 odd lap old hard tyres. So the lead was provided on a plate for verstappen through the hand of the race director’s incompetent management and control of the race.
Both would’ve been worthy champions, it’s just a shame neither of them, The genuine fans, got a worthy race finish with enough integrity that everyone deserved.
F1 really neeeds to get proactive about the rules. They’re too ambiguous, too many loop holes. They should treat the racing protocols and the racing itself, like technical regulations - ambiguities should be clarified promptly and rules should be rewritten accordingly.
