I think we are talking past each other.hollus wrote: ↑26 Oct 2024, 18:36The whole penalty was worded as overtaking outside, and certainly it looks questionable who was overtaking.
This weekend, FIA did not say "we checked and we think Lando was never fully ahead". What FIA said is "nothing new". But McLarens appeal is not on a rule being applied wrongly, but on the wrong rule being applied. And thre is no question on what rule was applied.
I am not surprised that FIA covered their derrieres on the nothing new techincality, but I still think that they are holding two things as true that cannot be true simultaneously.
I think Lando had completed the overtake. It seems to me that the two of us are in agreement on that, at least by the definitions i had - until this race - personally used to determine who is the attacking/defending driver. However, the original document for Landos penalty states "Car 4 was overtaking Car 1 on the outside". This, to me, leaves absolutely no doubt, that the stewards disagree with our interpretation of what constitutes a succesfull overtake, and they still consider Max the defending driver.
We may disagree with that, but we have to accept that interpretation. The stewards are empowered to interpret the rules - we aren't. So we have to run with their interpretation.
From there, moving on to the appeal, i don't see the stewards doing anything wrong. If what they saw on the helicopter shot didn't convince them that it was a completed overtake, then i don't see anything new in the video from Max car that should do that either. So i don't see why they should change their mind after seeing the video from Max car. The two videos show the same thing from different perspectives - that Lando definitely had his rear axles ahead of Max front axles, but there was still some overlap of the cars in terms of what lies outside the axles (wings etc.). So the new video didn't show us anything new.
So i don't see how you think they've contradicted themselves. To me, the videos show the same thing. I only disagree with their interpretation of what constitutes an overtake. But as already established in my earlier post, you cannot challenge interpretation - you can only challenge based upon new and relevant evidence.