Sebastian Vettel, Ferrari, Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, 2019

Ferrari request right to review on Vettel Canada penalty

2019 F1 Season

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Ferrari have confirmed that they have requested the right to review on Sebastian Vettel’s race-win-deciding Canadian Grand Prix penalty.

The five-second time penalty was awarded to Vettel during the race in Montreal, following an incident where he left the track, driving over a grassy run-off area and then was deemed to have rejoined the track in an unsafe fashion.

Immediately following the race, Ferrari notified the FIA that they intended to appeal the penalty, although final classification was issued with Hamilton as the winner.

The FIA appeals process then gave Ferrari 96 hours to lodge their protest against the decision. Rather than let that expire (which has no consequence, if a team do not lodge an appeal) Ferrari chose to notify the ruling body that they were withdrawing their intention to appeal last Thursday.

At the time, the team indicated that they could still protest the penalty under a different aspect of FIA regulation, the right to review.

Article 14 of the FIA’s International Sporting Code, a regulatory document that governs all FIA championships including Formula One, details a ‘Right to Review’ for any decision taken by FIA stewards:

14.1.1 If, in Competitions forming part of an FIA Championship, cup, trophy, challenge or series, or of an international series, a significant and relevant new element is discovered which was unavailable to the parties seeking the review at the time of the Competition concerned, whether or not the stewards have already given a ruling, these stewards or, failing this, those designated by the FIA, must meet (in person or by other means) on a date agreed amongst themselves, summoning the party or parties concerned to hear any relevant explanations and to judge in the light of the facts and elements brought before them.

Using this Right to Review would be conditional on Ferrari finding new evidence, which was unavailable to the stewards when taking their original decision during the Canadian Grand Prix.

Ferrari had 14 days after the original decision to request the right to review, taking them up to the date of the French Grand Prix. According to the current stewarding schedule, at least one steward from Canada will take up the role again this weekend in France.

Today, a Ferrari spokesperson said the team have now requested the right of review, as per the conditions laid out in Article 14 of the International Sporting Code. The team must now submit new evidence, which will be evaluated as to whether it is ‘significant and relevant’ to the decision by the stewards, before the incident can be reviewed.

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110 comments on “Ferrari request right to review on Vettel Canada penalty”

  1. So, what happens if the stewards find in favour of Ferrari?

    1. I don’t get it, surely nothing?

      It’s a penalty awarded during the race, I thought they couldn’t appeal those

      Are the rules different when it’s applied afterwards

      1. Jamie B, you are right that the International Sporting Code does reiterate in the document that type of penalty cannot be appealed against and that the judgement of the stewards is final.

        14.2 of the code does also state that “A review has no suspensive effect on the execution of the original decision of the stewards when they have given a ruling.”, so it would seem that there would be no change in terms of the race order. It would seem that the only thing that Ferrari might be able to achieve might be some sort of symbolic success which they can use for political ends or to gain influence in the media, but in reality it is likely that nothing will change.

        Overall, I would not be surprised if, given the very limited options Ferrari have in this case, the stewarding panel will probably just dismiss the case as bringing no new evidence to the table.

        Witan, with regards to your point below, I think it is unlikely that the stewarding panel would penalise Vettel any further – if there was any sort of penalty, I suspect it’s more likely to be an additional penalty against Ferrari for bringing a protest “in bad faith” and acting as a vexatious litigant.

        1. As far as I understand it, Anon is correct here – I’m not sure the right to review has ever been activated in these specific circumstances (a race-win-affecting penalty against driver action, rather than technical infringement) or at least can’t find any examples of it in F1, though, so precedent is unclear. (maybe I am looking in the wrong place!)

          1. I would have thought this rule is there to cover incidents such as
            (1) Trulli, Hamilton, and David Ryan at Australia 2009
            and
            (2) Briatore, Symonds, Piquet, Alonso at Singapore 2008

            Question – where can I find the FIA sporting code everyone is referring to? The one I found on FIA website seems outdated.
            https://www.fia.com/sites/default/files/regulation/file/2014%20International%20Sporting%20Code%20%28FR-EN%29.pdf

          2. Another incident was Perez and Massa at Canada 2014

            “Force India has been successful in convincing the FIA to review its decision to punish Sergio Perez for causing a last lap crash with Felipe Massa at the Canadian Grand Prix”

            Force India argued last week that the race stewards should look again at the crash and consider Perez’s own testimony on what happened.

            The Mexican had been unable to speak to the stewards in Canada because he was in hospital at the time having precautionary checks.

            The FIA met with Force India representatives on Friday morning in Austria to decide whether or not Perez’s version of events could be considered as new evidence to justify a new hearing.

            Following that meeting, it was agreed that there were indeed enough grounds to look once again at what happened.

            An FIA statement said: “The team submitted that it was unaware when summonsed to the original hearing that its driver was po tentially to be charged with causing a collision and that because it had been unable to communicate with the driver after the collision, as the driver was in hospital, they attended the original hearing without input from the driver as to the cause of the incident.

            “Further the team submitted that it had now had the opportunity to speak with the driver on the circumstances leading to the incident under review and had been able to consider the relevant telemetry.

            “The team requested that these new elements, namely the verbal testimony of its driver and the relevant telemetry be considered, and that the Decision in Document 44 be reviewed.

            “We note for the record that these are exceptional circumstances, namely where the driver was taken to hospital and unable to communicate with his team or attend the hearing, and this determination is not to be considered a precedent.”

    2. I believe there is president for the 2 penalty points given to Vettel to be removed if Ferrari are successful. But as others have said I don’t believe the race result can be changed.
      I would be surprised if even Ferrari believe this will achieve anything and see this entirely as a political statement by Ferrari.

  2. The review means they only have to present new evidence and so escape the possible need to reveal all their telemetry. The stewards can decide that evidence is not significant new evidence or if they think it is ( as the article states) then review the decision.

    If they review the penalty and decide to remove it a whole can of worms is opened as there have been several similar penalties the teams did not appeal, most notable Verstappen twice in the previous season.

    On the other hand (according to Toto Wolf) if the stewards on review think the penalty was too lenient they might increase it. Could they take Vettel off the podium completely?

    1. escape the possible need to reveal all their telemetry.

      The stewards already have full access to all of the telemetry from every car.

      Teams no longer use there own systems to transmit/receive the data or team radio communications now, It all goes through the FOM system along with the OnBoard camera feeds so FOM, The FIA & stewards have access to everything.

      It’s all transmitted through the communications unit in the center of the T-cam on the roll-bar, Goes through the FOM/TATA fibre network setup around the circuit which sends it to the FOM TV tent where it’s stored on a server which the stewards have access to via some software where they can view any camera angle, Listen to any bit of team radio or view any piece of timing or telemetry data they wish to.

      1. Anthony Blears
        17th June 2019, 21:22

        Insightful as always, thanks @gt-racer

      2. The flow of telemetry data is not the same as analysed and transposed data. The stewards are not GCHQ ( or NSA in the USA) with banks of super computers to monitor all electronic communication. And the volume of data passing around F1 teams is astronomical and the machinery and staffing for it is a hefty part of their budgets.

        That is why there are so many monitoring a team’s data back at base during the race and then for days afterwards. So stewards being able to tap into the stream does not mean they can analyse everything as the race progresses. They have to make an informed decision from the data initially seemingly then most important, such as video feeds, radio traffic and basic car data.

        The only possible new evidence is either human sources, probably Vettel, or some of the results of the derailed analysis after the race.

      3. There’s a caveat there– The teams generate their own data feeds, which are spectacularly massive, and get downloaded over wi-fi or direct download in the pits. The FIA doesn’t have access to that data during the race (and probably doesn’t want it).

        However, it’s obvious watching the races that steering angle, throttle, brakes, gear, DRS, battery, fuel-load, and a host of other information is available in real-time to FIA/FOM, because it’s often being displayed on the world feed. So the stewards can match up Vettel’s steering input and Hamilton’s braking, with the video feed, while they’re making their decisions.

        So while Ferrari may be able to demonstrate the wear rate and front / rear axle loads over time, and downforce levels across various parts of the car during the incident, I doubt they’ll have any relevant telemetry that the FIA hasn’t already seen.

  3. Stop it now. Would be utterly ridiculous if they changed the results weeks after the race. Who cares now. Try and get the rules changed for 2020 instead.

    1. What a democratic approach. They have every right to have a review, so why not let them have it?

      1. @pironitheprovocateur Aha. Let’s leave official results of the races in doubt for months. Because every other race, there is going to be something and they could request ‘Right to Review’.

    2. @f1mre I actually think a review is a good idea. To change the rules in 2020 would imply that there was something wrong with the rules now. A way to analyse whether there is something wrong with the rules now is to perform a review.

      The best decisions made are the ones based on evidence. A review is harmless.

      1. Peppe (@turbopeppino)
        17th June 2019, 22:32

        @georgeod
        Indeed. Well put.

      2. I actually think a review is a good idea.

        So do I, but with some caveats.

        Firstly, once it has been declared, only something very serious should alter the race result. Think a discovery of a serious non-compliance in a car or a driver admitting that he purposely crashed into another.

        Secondly, the main purpose should be to review the decision made for the purposes of informing future decisions. That could be to pass information to stewards for future reference or clarification, to inform future changes in the rules, or similar. Any non-completed-race-affecting penalty (like penalty points, grid penalties, fines etc) could be changed on the result of the review, but that shouldn’t be its primary purpose.

  4. Not sure what they hope to accomplish here.

    If they had ‘new evidence’ why did they not appeal and present it then, why go for the review option? What can they hope to accomplish?

  5. joe pineapples
    17th June 2019, 18:35

    Can’t help but think they should have just moved on and concentrate more on making their car & driver more capable.

    1. Jonathan Parkin
      17th June 2019, 18:51

      Or alternatively let Charles Leclerc win a race

      1. joe pineapples
        17th June 2019, 19:06

        indeed

      2. Before that can happen, he should try to qualify withing half a second of the front row. Or not fall behind the top two 6-7 seconds in the first stint.
        LEC is a nice decent young driver. But the making of a world champion includes the ability to produce stunning laps in Q3 when all the pressure is on. HAM and VET have done that from the very beginning of their careers, on the road to 9 total titles. LEC ain’t there and might never be.

        1. He would have actually won a race already this season. He was dominating that race something vettel has failed to do this season

          1. This does not exclude what @crystakke said.

        2. F1oSaurus (@)
          18th June 2019, 19:31

          @crystakke Bottas and Leclerc were giving their team mates a tow. Who were then both 7 tenths faster. As was explained to Leclerc over the radio.

          There is no reason to suggest that if Vettel had given Leclerc a tow then Leclerc could not have gotten pole instead.

      3. Yeah… if it’s deserved. Otherwise, you’re suggesting to have team orders, which is something most fans don’t like. Bahrain aside, LEC did not prove much.

    2. It’s not like they have shortage of staff to concentrate on both

  6. This should present the opportunity for the FIA to penalise Vettel for his post race tantrums. A huge fine and time spent doing some good works for the FIA should sort it out, not another fireside chat with Todt.

    1. What Vettel did after the race adds ten times more to the DNA of F1 than 10 soulless Mercedes victories. Stop this politically correct bs, no one’s interested.

      1. @pironitheprovocateur Maybe your team should try winning on it own merit rather than blaming other team’s for it technical and driver inadequacies. Vettel’s behaviour was harmless funny-pathetic if you like that sort of thing. The real F1 was on track though, where he failed, again. It’s a shame you can’t just take that on the chin and move on.

        1. Arne Scholte
          17th June 2019, 23:05

          👍🏽💯

        2. If he really thinks that maybe he should go to the circus instead of watching F1, can you imagine the fallout on here if Hamilton or Max had thrown a tantrum like that, right or wrong the penalty was imposed “within the letter of the law” by stewards with far more data and knowledge than us…. sad tifosi fans and Ferrari should move on, however I do sincerely hope that the FIA if they allow a review of the penalty DO NOT increase it, the incident is over and should be forgotten.

          1. petebaldwin (@)
            18th June 2019, 13:58

            Yeah – Max and Hamilton are well known for keeping cool and not throwing tantrums to be fair……

        3. “Take that on the chin and move on.” Vettel has done that many times throughout his career. What he doesn’t want is to take from behind like the FIA wants to give it. Not a serious commentator or F1 driver, not Mansell, not Andretti, not Villeneuve, not Button, not Ricciardo (directly involved in a very similar incident with Hamilton,) not even Brundle thought that was a penalty. And in all honesty, it has nothing to do with Vettel, it has everything to do with the soul of this sport: it’s time to get this officiating bussiness right. If they judged football like they do F1 it would be pandemonium. The problem is not Vettel having to take it on the chin, the problem is officials and fans like you who don’t even have a chin where to take it.

          1. F1oSaurus (@)
            18th June 2019, 19:33

            Ricciardo took one on the chin (getting blamed partially for Baku 2018), but then left the team who did that to him

      2. Provocateur

        “…a person who provokes trouble or incites dissension; agitator; agent provocateur…”

        You’re not very good at it, are you?

      3. So what vettel just avoids criticism because he isn’t currently in a dominant car? The penalty was fair the only reason people are bitching is because it let merc win another race

        1. Vettel had only two chances for an easy race victory this season Canada & Monza. Seeing he cocked up the first Ferrari are clutching at straws with this review. The 5 sec penalty is unlikely to be overturned & could lead to further sanctions. What evidence do Ferrari have that the Stewards weren’t privy too. Maybe it was Vettel’s time of the month!!!

          1. CCTV footage of the guy in the pearly outfit lobbing banana skins on the track.

      4. @pironitheprovocateur

        What Vettel did after the race adds ten times more to the DNA of F1 than 10 soulless Mercedes victories.

        It did add to the drama and i agree that we dont get to see such dramatic moments in dull races which are becoming more frequent by the day. But i think you will agree that what Vettel did after the race was very unprofessional especially that moment when he changed the ‘P1 and P2 boards’. It doesn’t set a good precedent or an example for those looking up to him. Also, what was the point of all that ? To show that he is unhappy and angry ? What did it prove ? Nothing. Completely avoidable.

      5. F1oSaurus (@)
        18th June 2019, 19:45

        @pironitheprovocateur -1

        At least Hamilton made the effort to keep pressure on Vettel for the entire race. So much so that in the end Vettel cracked and we almost got to see a battle for position. Unfortunately Vettel ruined that by cheating, landing himself a penalty and losing himself the race like that.

  7. This is a test for the FIA as in earlier seasons Ferrari would have been able to use their clout to get what they wanted. Will they be treated the same as Red Bull twice last season or will the stewards yield to political pressure?

    If they do F1 is in trouble as the rules, like the financial bungs, will be delivered unevenly. There will be no hope then for new entrants nor for keeping manufactures other than Ferrari in the game. Why should they sink millions into their teams to compete on a tilted pitch?

    1. That’s such a paradox from someone who’s comments are obviously pro-Mercedes. Brackley and Stuttgart have been far more powerful politically than Ferrari for some time now and they clever request for the new tyres just shows it.

      1. I am going to go on a limb here – I think you both are in the wrong in how much clout either of ‘your’ teams’ competitor has currently; I do have to agree that looking at the results at least @pironitheprovocateur has the advantage that he’s right insofar as Mercedes as a team operating more cleverly, while Ferrari throw their history and supposed importance around (with no WDC/WCC coming so far).

      2. they clever request for the new tyres just shows it.

        Now,if such was the case,then Ferrari should have address the issue before the beginning of 2019 season,not in the mid of the season.Mind that

      3. Arne Scholte
        17th June 2019, 23:09

        No one is more powerful then Ferrari in F1 dude. Or did you forget to take your meds again?💊💊
        🤪🤪

      4. @pironitheprovocateur, these would be tyres that Ferrari develop during the tests for them in 2018 and which Ferrari voted in favour of being introducing for 2019?

    2. @Witan

      Verstappen-Raikkonen incident from last year is totally different. I find it silly to claim it is a “precedent”. Vettel was fully ahead of Hamilton when he fully came back on the track – at least that’s what the cameras show.

      1. Well, not quite, once Vettel was within a car’s width of the outer track boundary, yes, Hamilton was indeed behind him, but that was only because he got off the throttle, and perhaps on the brakes, when he saw space between Vettel and wall (outside of the track) was gone.

        1. @bosyber

          I mean, according to this video, Hamilton has no part of his car alongside when Vettel initially came back fully on-track. This is when his car is still all the way on the left side of the track, and it seems this is when Hamilton sees there might be a gap, in other words, before he is on the brakes with the gap disappearing as Vettel drifts to the right of the track

          https://www.instagram.com/p/BygJs-yASes/

          Whereas Verstappen pretty much had Raikkonen right next to him as he came back on-track.

  8. The key to this evidence will most likely be the state of the gas and break pedal while going over the grass

    1. @mpm that is available to everyone, and visible during the race, and he was on throttle after grass, so it was his actions after off that unsettled the car and more so he had corrected the car but unsettled it once more to block hamilton with an excuse of “fighting the car”

      this is not his first mistake under pressure and not first “blameless attitude”… in fact every one of his pressure induced mistakes were deflected as “the other drivers’ fault”… even more so his attitude is kind of quite rude towards race officials be it stewards directors…. and he usually drags these cases further than everyone else…

      1. “this is not his first mistake under pressure” literally has nothing to do with the incident. Vettel could have had 1000 incidents under pressure before and still not deserve a penalty for the current incident.

        1. F1oSaurus (@)
          18th June 2019, 19:37

          The point is, Vettel keeps doing stuff like this while ALWAYS blaming others. He can’t complain that once in a while he gets a penalty for his reckless driving..

          1. @f1osaurus

            How was that reckless driving? First of all, reckless driving does not relate to racing. Reckless driving happens on the streets. On the track we have racing.
            Second, no commentator found Vettel’s handling of the situation to be dangerous (reckless was not used in their analysis, because it does not belong in racing).
            It’s really amazing the bizarre arguments people make these days, completely devout of facts and logic.

  9. Adam (@rocketpanda)
    17th June 2019, 19:48

    I don’t see the point in pursuing it? Even if hypothetically they have huge new evidence or whatever that enables them to successfully overturn the penalty and reclaim the victory… why? Firstly the points are almost meaningless in the championship, secondly it makes a mockery of the stewards and thirdly it is YET ANOTHER race win decided in a office – which is essentially what nobody liked about this mess in the first place. The most likely result is Ferrari get told to give it up and so they’ll pout and posture and ultimately do nothing so the outcome of this is absolutely zero.

    1. The race has already been decided in the office and Vettel crossed the finish line first. His race was decided on track, no matter how the Merc boyos want to twist the facts and argue with “gaining an unfair advantage which cost Hamilton the lead” (nonsense).

      1. GtisBetter (@)
        17th June 2019, 21:50

        The finishing order is always an unofficial result, so crossing the line first, doesn’t mean you are the winner.

      2. @pironitheprovocateur I hope you’re done crying you little boy. HAM had to break after being squeezed between VET and the wall, whether you like it or not he won. IF and only IF HAM was far behind then VET would have escaped the penalty, but squeezing the other driver by turning right AFTER returning to the track deserves a penalty, this is what all cameras and telemetry showed. this is an UNSAFE RE-ENTRY to the track.

  10. I really can’t understand what’s so galling about this race result when, at least to my untrained eyes, Ferrari have frivolously shed points at other races. How do Ferrari want to view this season at the end of this year? Currently it seems they want to finish this season be thinking “We had our best race result STOLEN from us”. Wouldn’t they much rather be thinking “We really made it difficult for Mercedes this year”? If the latter is what they want to be thinking then they’ll need to do some soul searching.

  11. What on earth does Ferrari hope to accomplish? There’s no way that the five second penalty can be rescinded because then Mercedes would have a cast iron argument that Hamilton could have pushed harder over the remaining 20 laps and perhaps been able to overtake Vettel. The race is run. It’s done. Over.
    Imagine if every refereeing decision involving a goal in soccer that was later determined to be wrong (World Cup England v. Germany, 1966 and 2010 anyone??) was reversed after the match was over.

    1. Well, the rules allow for this, so I’m sure if Ferrari thinks they have something then they have the right to bring it and get a further ruling. If you are right that the 5 seconds can’t be rescinded, maybe they just want the recognition that they were wronged. Maybe they just want to set a precedent for the future. Maybe they just want an apology.

      1. Maybe Vettel should stay on the track during the races. Maybe?

        1. Maybe stewards should punish mercedes drivers as much as they do to the other drivers? Maybe brazil 2018? Maybe spa 2018? Maybe monaco 2016? Maybe more than 5 sec hungary 2018?

  12. The only ‘New Evidence’ there likely to have is testimony from Vettel as well as possibly ask them to factor in the views of other drivers (Former & Current, The majority of who seemingly feel the penalty was absurd) while comprehending the video/data they have already seen.

    The stewards will have already seen every bit of footage & all of the data from both cars as they have full access to all of that so there’s nothing in terms of Video/Data that Ferrari could present that would be new to them.

    1. @gt-racer Just a question/comment. Might they be bringing into play the fact that LH put himself into the zone of SV’s ‘dangerous re-joining of the track’ by going for a gap in a risky way given he had a car in front of him that wasn’t entirely under control? Had LH held back out of preservation of his own car and race there wouldn’t have been any danger to SV’s rejoining. An SV who, imho, did everything he could with few options ie. he didn’t intentionally cut LH off but LH intentionally went for a gap that was never guaranteed to be there when he got there.

      1. Last I checked, the object of a race is to come in first. If the guy in front of you makes a mistake, how is it the guy in back’s fault if he wants to take advantage and try to squirt through? I’m pretty sure that’s how you win races. Face it: Vettel made a mistake. He paid the price.

        As punishment, I might have only demanded that he give the position to Hamilton, although I don’t know if that was an option. At least it would have given Vettel the opportunity to regain the position. To me, that would have been fairer than to allow Hamilton to sit back and win the race by being less than 5 seconds behind.

        1. @robertwilliams But just because a guy in front makes a small mistake does not mean there is always an automatic opening for the trailing car. There’s passing and then there’s trying to squirt through when there is really no room. Vettel made a mistake. Not all mistakes deserve a lost position. Some mistakes are recovered from in time, as was SV’s.

          1. I’m going to go out on a limb and say that you might be the only one on this comment string that defines that as a small mistake. His small mistake required Hamilton to hit the brakes to avoid damage to both cars. That’s why he earned the penalty.

          2. LH only hit the brakes when SV was coming back on the track and getting back on the power, after SV had already been on the grass. LH had plenty of time when he first saw SV go off to assess the situation and back off for his own safety. Rather, he thought he’d go for a gap he thought might be there only to find SV had recovered in time and gotten on the gas to stay ahead of LH. I’m not alone, far from it, amongst those who consider this a racing incident and not penalty worthy.

          3. But @robbie, Hamilton didn’t ‘go for a gap’, he drove on the racing line that had been vacated by Vettel. Do you get the difference?

          4. @david-br Of course I do but LH could see or had to assume that SV rejoining at such a narrow place was always going to make staying on it in an unpredictable situation risky. Why would LH assume SV would be able to rejoin well to his left such that he should just stay on the throttle and breeze by only to find he had to brake? LH couldn’t have been that surprised at where SV ended up.

        2. “To finish first, first you must finish… or be within 5 secs of the first finisher”

      2. An SV who, imho, did everything he could with few options ie. he didn’t intentionally cut LH off but LH intentionally went for a gap that was never guaranteed to be there when he got there.

        The penalties penalize both the act and intent. As long as one of those is present the penalty is deserved. Here the stewards under the current rules believe Seb could have come back more safely than he did. And they are right. They have not judged him to have intentionally tried to hit Hamilton.

      3. But Vettel didn’t ‘do everything he could’, because he didn’t give up the place he had retained by leaving the track. If he had, no penalty would have been given – imo – and he’d have had an excellent chance of overtaking Hamilton for the win.

        1. Since many consider this a racing incident as did SV and Ferrari, why would he give his place to LH only to see the faster car drive off into the sunset? But if the stewards deemed that was something SV needed to do, they could have ruled so during the race, but they didn’t. They deemed the infraction to be not so severe that SV couldn’t have still won the race, by retaining a five second gap.

          1. the stewards do not have the option of switching cars around. They can hand out a time penalty, or stop/go penalty.

            They had a very simple decision to make. Did Vettel 1) rejoin the track in a dangerous manner? Or, 2) did Vettel leave at least one cars width while defending his position?

            If they think he didn’t rejoin in a dangerous manner, then he is guilty of 2). If they think he didn’t leave the car widths because he wasn’t in control then he’s guilty of 1).

            You simply can’t have one without the other being true.

            Those are the rules, whether you agree with them or not, and the rules the stewards were mandated to follow. Once the rule was established to be broken, their only option was to hand out a penalty, which they did using the least severe option they had open to them.

            Now, we can have a conversation over whether the rules are right, but that’s a whole different conversation, even if I’m inclined to agree with you on that point. However the discussion here is over whether the rules were followed correctly and I’m afraid they were.

        2. @Dave The concept of giving up the place to LH is only in the minds of offended LH fans. If the stewards thought that was SV’s obligation they would have ruled so during the race and likely immediately.

          1. Utter nonsense. That’s not a sanction available to them. It is up to a driver to avoid investigation and penalties by giving up any advantage gained by leaving the track.

            Since there is simply no question about the advantage gained, your constant dissembling looks rather silly. Vettel cut straight across two corners instead of following the track. It was dangerous too, but even if he’d come back on safely there was still always going to be a penalty.

          2. @robbie, as Dave notes, it is impossible for the stewards to give an official ruling to order Vettel to give up the place to Hamilton because no such option exists in the regulations.

            It is true that some teams have ordered a driver to give up a place to another driver as a way of appeasing the stewards and as part of a “gentleman’s agreement” that, if the team and driver gives up the place voluntarily, the stewards will not investigate the original incident.

            It was an informal and unauthorised system that only worked whilst both sides were prepared to abide by a set of unwritten rules. Now, though, you get the impression that gentleman’s agreement has broken down because the teams prefer to just gamble on being able to build up enough of a gap to offset the penalty, with the stewards being pushed to issue the penalty because they suspect the teams will no longer honour that informal agreement.

      4. F1oSaurus (@)
        18th June 2019, 19:41

        @robbie OMG that is just hilarious. So you are saying that it’s not an unsafe reentry, but that the drivers who actually manage to keep their car on track should just park and wait till the guy who went off ahead makes it safely back on track?

        Dude you are just too much. My stomach hurts from laughing.

        1. @f1osaurus No that is not what I am saying but of course I can trust you to try to twist it that way. Sorry to hear you have a stomach ache.

  13. Maybe this brand new evidence shows that it was in fact Ericsson who had taken over Vettel’s throttle pedal and steering wheel and he was therefore blameless.

    1. Montréalais (@)
      18th June 2019, 3:07

      James Neutron: Best comment yet! +1

    2. No-no-no.
      Did you remember what this Ericsson guy has done to Grosjean?!
      He pushed Grosjean into a wall!

      The same way he pushed Vettel in Canada… the only difference – Vettel skillfully avoided hitting the wall by!

  14. Breaking news: New evidence emerges in Vettel-Hamilton Canadian battle!

    At the moment of “blocking” incident the car No. 5 was driven by… a Groundhog!!! It accidentally got behind the wheel when Vettel cut across the grass!

    1. you got it all wrong. the seaguls from a few years ago drove the car. vettel said they were undercover mercedes spies :P

  15. roberto giacometti
    18th June 2019, 6:35

    Seriously , what would Gilles make of all this nonsense …..???????

    1. He’d probably think it was nothing compared to what was going on in the sport in the early 1980s, such as when Ferrari deliberately ran an illegal car and got Gilles disqualified in the 1982 US Grand Prix as a protest against the way in which other teams were also rather blatantly cheating that season.

      1. F1oSaurus (@)
        18th June 2019, 19:43

        That still happens. Or at least Red Bull did it a few years ago with Ricciardo when they insisted the fuel flow meters were not working and got Ricciardo’s disqualified after getting on the podium.

        In the end it was demonstrated that Red Bull’s own software was faulty. Ooops.

  16. What if they find in Vettel’s favour? Surely they can’t just swap the positions of the first two cars; the race might have played out differently if the penalty hadn’t been given. It’s fantasy F1 at this point.

    1. That’s a valid question. Mercedes can quite correctly then complain that Hamilton would have tried harder to pass Vettel had he not know a five second penalty was in place. I can’t fault Ferrary for trying and exhausting all avenues available to them even if only to make a point. Will see how it plays out. However, F1 cannot go on like it’s business as usual. There was a reason fans weren’t happy in Canada and there is a reason most fans aren’t happy in general with FIA decision making. It’s inconsistent, it’s horrible, and it should not continue.

  17. “another souless mercedise win” … somenone texted here. does that mean if ferrari wins then its a passionate soulfull win? and lewis or bottas if they were to win are souless? with out passion? interesting… maybe ferrari are the souless ones. throwing away so many opportunities… crumbling under pressure making mistake after mistake after mistake…

  18. Just let it go already.

  19. Seems that Ferrari finally found something… their balls. It’s the right thing to do, even if it will end in nothing. Vettel will have a public recognition of the team backing him and the tifosi will see that Ferrari doesn’t accept something that was, in their view, wrong.

    I still can’t believe that they sacrifice the race on the altar of safety while leaving a car parked in a dangerous spot for the entire race. Like the last serious accident in F1 was not due to someone losing control and hitting something that wasn’t supposed to be there.

  20. How low this team is going to stoop for an over-glorified “world champion” who crumbles easier than a cookie? Its quite farcical to see team principal(even President in previous cases) support this nutcase even after amount of public shame Vettel has brought this team which prides itself in “tradition”.

  21. If it adds some spice to the Netflix show, I’m all for the pointless review.

    Oh wait, Ferrari haven’t signed up to the show to focus on the championship. Doh

  22. Its just Ferrari trying to get some form of a win after being comprehensively outplayed. Vettel and the teams performance in many areas hasn’t been up to scratch, Canada and Monza are possibly the only track where there concept will deliver. Anyway its swings and roundabouts I always felt that Vettels punishment at Baku 2017 was far too lenient.

    1. even one in Mexico 2016 was way too lenient. Looking how fast cookie crumbles, maybe Leclerc will deliver the win in Monza.

  23. :D What else could they submit, was there a rodent present on the inside of the corner? Vettel did his one for wildlife and dodged it to the racing line, rejoining safely for the rodent?

    That being said, this is all a farse. In Olden days of Senna, this would be completely normal behavior. We now have tarmac runoff areas, so nobody knows how to handle a driver going off on grass. If we had normal race tracks this would be way more normal and racing more fun. The drama was super funny, but deciding things offtrack is back for the show.

    Unless it is deliberate crashing or blatant Maldonadoism, then there should be no penalties. Let them race, they have the skill to do it. I am convinced without the penalty Hamilton would have forced the overtake properly, had he not known there will be a penalty.

    And even if he didn’t? Champion would be the same and we would have a better show.

  24. My guess is that Ferrari just want to unsettle things a bit – or specifically Mercedes and Hamilton. They’ve apparently got few options left to rescue their title bid. having chosen the less optimal aero path following the new front wing regulations. I’m not so sure it’s a good idea as far as Vettel is concerned. He was beginning to recover form, as Canada showed. Maybe it will be galvanize him to keep up the pressure on Mercedes, but the fact he did (factually speaking) make a race-losing mistake, again, just adds to the spin he had in Bahrain, again under pressure from Hamilton, and suggests he needs a calmer environment to achieve his best.

    1. F1oSaurus (@)
      18th June 2019, 20:00

      @david-br It’s probably easier to blame others for making yet another blunder.

      The thing is though, unless he owns up to his blunders he will never learn to stop making them. Which is probably why he has been making these mistakes/blunders ever since his first season. He already lost the WDC in 2009, 2017 and 2018 because of this:
      2009 AUS, MAL, MON, HUN, SIN
      2017 AZE, CAN, GBR, SIN, MEX
      2018 AZE, FRA, AUT, GER, ITA, JPN, USA

      And this season he should have had at least 2 wins to his name (Bahrain and Canada). Realistically Baku should also have been his, but his quali was poor. If he had had those 2 or 3 wins then the WDC would have been wide open still.

      1. 2017 and 2018 apart from Vettel’s mistakes there were quite a few strategic blunders pointing blame at the team itself. 2017 GBR wasn’t Vettel’s mistake it was purely teams strategic fault.

  25. Half of Vettel’s anger probably stemmed from trying to divert attention from his own mistake. It’s getting a little embarrassing now to be honest, this kind of emotional response to a penalty. Like I’ve said before, I just wish Charlie Whiting was around still and the places could have been switched during the race.

  26. Don’t believe anything will come out of it. Nevertheless congrats to the F1 stewards for getting the 2019 Canadian Grand Prix a surefire place on the Racefans 10 Worst rated races since 2008 list. Well done! clap clap clap

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