The FIA Formula 1 race director tends to get blamed for things which don’t necessarily fall within their domain.
Penalty decisions, to take one example, are a particularly common cause for confusion among fans. The race director can – and often does – query incidents which they feel should be looked at. But it’s the stewards who do the looking-at.It’s the stewards who decide whether to penalise a driver and, if so, how. Nonetheless, the race director often gets it in the ear from those who disapprove of decisions they didn’t make.
That much was clear in the reaction from some on social media yesterday to the news of Niels Wittich’s surprise departure from the role.
So, few were surprised when, soon afterwards, came word Wittich hadn’t chosen to move on, as the FIA’s statement claimed, in order to “pursue new opportunities”.
The F1 race director’s responsibility is to ensure the safe and smooth running of grands prix as laid down by the FIA’s rules. Wittich appears to have done this well, certainly compared to the standard set by his predecessor, whose error during his final race in charge plunged F1 into crisis as it arguably swung the outcome of the 2021 world championship.
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F1 race director is a uniquely demanding role, where decisions are taken in split seconds and the stakes, as Michael Masi discovered, are extremely high. He has been thrust into the role at almost zero notice three seasons prior when his predecessor Charlie Whiting died on the eve of the 2019 championship. But though Masi ultimately lost his job by triggering a controversy which brought F1 into disrepute, other troubling incidents also occured on his watch.
The FIA’s subsequent investigation into the farcical 2021 championship decider concluded Masi had become over-stretched due to the demands of his workload. It’s not hard to see how this was the case amid the strains of two consecutive seasons badly disrupted by Covid-19.
F1’s regulations had to be extensively overhauled to allow races to go ahead amid a pandemic. A string of events were cancelled and calendars compressed with multiple double- and triple-headers. Masi’s time between races was consumed by conducting inspections of a series of tracks which were added to the calendar, including two new venues in the run-up to Abu Dhabi.
Added to that was the fierce rivalry between Red Bull and Mercedes as Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton scrapped for the championship. Masi was repeatedly called upon to make decisions which potentially had huge implications for the title fight – right up to the crucial one he got wrong.
So, in the aftermath of one of F1’s biggest controversies for years, the series found itself needing a new race director. It settled on two: Wittich from Germany’s DTM series and his WEC counterpart Eduardo Freitas, who rotated the job between them over the 22-round 2022 season.
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At the time FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem indicated the governing body would prefer to rotate race directors. Wittich covered the first five races that year, then regularly swapped with Freitas.
But Wittich is far from the first notable name within the FIA to depart over the past 12 months, however. Among those who have left in that time are sporting director Steve Nielsen, technical director Tim Goss, chief executive Natalie Robyn and the head of its commission for women, Deborah Mayer.
F1’s new race director is Rui Marques, who took charge of Formula 2’s events in the same weekend Wittich first ran an F1 race. Marques did not appear to expect a move up to F1 was imminent in an interview earlier this year. “In three years’ time, if I’m still doing what I’m doing today, I’m more than happy,” he said. “My career is moving a bit [towards] the single seater part in Formula 2 and Formula 3, I’m more than happy to continue this path.”
Wittich deserves credit for the effective but usually low-key job he did. One key change he implemented came immediately after his appointment in the form of a clarification of the rules on track limits.
Under Masi, F1 not only enforced different rules at different corners on the same track, but even different rules at different sessions on the same weekend. Wittich’s insistence that the white line should be the border everywhere finally forced F1 to start implementing effective solutions to one of its most unnecessary problems this year.
But arguably Wittich’s greater strength as a race director was that, unlike his predecessor, he never allowed himself to become the story. That’s the goal his replacement, F1’s fifth race director in six years, should strive for.
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An Sionnach
13th November 2024, 8:46
I don’t underestimate the difficulty of the job. Masi tried to be fair and open, talking to the teams. The rule book stated that the race director’s decision is final in such circumstances, so he came up with a novel, fair solution. He was sent packing for not following a convention that wasn’t written into the rules as an absolute necessity. His firing was a political one. It’s fair enough to point out his failings, but I think the purpose of the article – to be fair to the race director – is undermined by the fact that Masi will never be given a fair hearing.
Gasly was to blame for the danger in Japan as he was speeding. He had earned a race ban for this alone, but he would not accept responsibility. It should not have mattered whether he did or not.
If Whiting was subjected to the same level of scrutiny, would he have survived so long? F1 has made the role of race director an unenviable one by not protecting its employees in situations where the rules are the issue. Fire the director, change the rules, reset.
If race directors did as so many do in F1 – kick up a fuss to get what they want – what would happen? No races at all. In each sacking it’s important to understand the reason and be fair. What was the problem this time? The Brazilian GP was almost a farce. Was the race director to blame for anything? Lando, George and the entire field driving off without a green light and how that was handled by the stewards seems to have been the main issue. I don’t see how this could be the race director’s fault. They should have all been black flagged, but I somehow doubt F1 would be happy with this. Was there another problem? When the red flag was waved in qualifying, when yellow flags were used, VSC, safety car? I liked the use of yellows and the reluctance to go straight to something else. I can see the argument Max and Red Bull rule made about qualifying as there is no point in the session remaining open when nobody can do a lap. Still, Lance was trying to move. Red Bull should accept it as one of those things. Perhaps they have? The use of yellows, VSC, safety car and red flags in the race seemed fine. Surely McLaren could not have complained? If there was machinery on track while the cars were there (I’m not sure if this happened), who cares? Under yellows the drivers have to slow down and need to accept responsibility for their driving, especially since it could cause a fatality.
Yes, race directors should not be above scrutiny as Whiting was, but they should also not be scapegoats or punching bags because F1 doesn’t have the spine to stand up to the whining and game-playing of the teams, drivers, fans and press.
An Sionnach
13th November 2024, 8:56
Wittich may have been lucky to have been race director for so long. I suspect we’re in a situation that the race director will be fired no matter what at certain events. It doesn’t matter what they do, or what they don’t do. When there was more than one race director, each had a chance to be there or not at an event where there was no way for them to keep their jobs.
anon
13th November 2024, 10:26
You seem to be rather downplaying the seriousness of the near mises and breaches of the FIA’s own safety regulations by Masi. The race director’s role explicitly states that they are responsible for the safety of trackside workers, and he repeatedly failed at that requirement.
He really should have been fired much sooner than he was for those decisions, particularly given he made it clear that they were down to deliberate decisions on his part that put a priority on speed over safety.
S
13th November 2024, 10:46
And you seem to be over-inflating them, especially given the context of his predecessor. There were multiple deaths and cases of serious injury under Whiting’s watch.
At least Masi was honest in regard to which direction he was being pressured to steer F1, and it is exactly that which ultimately led to his removal from the role.
Jonathan Parkin
13th November 2024, 19:54
While it’s true there were multiple deaths or serious injuries while Charlie was the RD, we can’t pile them all on him
Paolo Ghislimberti died partly because he had run from his allotted position to check his fire fighting equipment
Graham Beveridge it is rumoured was escorting fans who were out of their seats into a safe area when the accident that would claim his life happened in front of him
Luciano Burti was guilty of a severe misjudgement when he collided with Eddie Irvine
It is true the race director has a duty of care, but so do individual people
S
14th November 2024, 8:28
Of course – but to promote the image that Masi was reckless while Whiting was a symbol of perfection is a gross misrepresentation of reality.
Indeed – and that includes racing drivers.
Ludewig
13th November 2024, 10:52
Masi clearly wasn’t fired over safety issues, though, but because of the Abu Dhabi ending.
anon
13th November 2024, 11:58
That doesn’t change the fact that he should have gone earlier due to his mismanagement of safety aspects earlier in the season. He did not show competence in a key area of his job, and should have either stepped down or been fired sooner (the incident in Imola really was inexcusable and would likely have seen race directors in junior series being investigated or fired for that).
CLK_GTR
13th November 2024, 17:07
Marshalls have been working on F1 track for years with no issues. The Imola incident was a driver catching up to the pack during safety car lap. F1 never changed rules on that, implemented any deltas for sectors where track work was going on and we saw Gasly driving dangerously in Suzuka 2022 and Colopinto crashing in Brazil 2024.
It is unbelievable hearing Wolff talk about Massi in a recent podcast, this guy got every advantage from the race director in 2021 (got a red bull rear wing banned and max blamed for blowout in Baku and then changed the tyre spec) and then spat him out when at the end of the year because he did not take Wolff on what he said.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
14th November 2024, 22:20
Gasly was driving well under his deltas, they’d simply been set wrong (if the information proffered is anything to go by). Colapinto was behind the Safety Car, didn’t have much choice over his speed and it is arguable that conditions were no longer in a fit state for F1 cars in any case (drivers were complaining about visibility and wet tyres would have reduced visibility further, which is why wet tyres are only raceable at certain tracks).
Wolff had seen the FIA break numerous regulations in Red Bull’s favour (including but not limited to running two races that by FIA regulation shouldn’t even have started), even before Abu Dhabi, and the FIA does not appear to have learned from it, so obviously he’s going to be upset with the FIA for its behaviour. (Getting components banned is something that happens most years, due to regulatory ambiguity and the arguments that different teams present for certain practises being within or without the regulations. If Red Bull got a wing banned, it was because it didn’t argue its case well enough). It was Pirelli who blamed Red Bull for its running conditions, which had nothing to do with Wolff or Race Control.
SPArtacus
15th November 2024, 0:40
Watching Gasly’s onboard shows he was clearly driving too fast. End of story. Even if the delta was “set wrong” (not sure what you’re even talking about), it wouldn’t be an excuse for violating his delta time. He wouldn’t know from his seat “oh, that delta is too slow, that’s a mistake. I can go faster.” More importantly, even if he had a delta that allowed him to go 3x the speed, it is a driver’s responsibility while under SC, especially knowing a vehicle recovery is under way, to ensure he is driving at a speed that allows him a huge margin (as in a speed in which you can make extremely aggressive steering or braking inputs without fearing the car will spin or lockup). All you needed to see was the car’s nervous body language to know he wasn’t driving anywhere near that standard.
Anyway, while I don’t think Wittich did anything wrong in that specific incident, I think Wittich has been poor at both extremes: overly cautious most of the time yet the 2-3 times an RF or SC was actually needed, he was somehow 10-20 seconds too slow.
S
15th November 2024, 8:34
Gasly was driving on a neutralised circuit – delta or no delta, he knew he had to be aware of and prepared for an incident. He even knew where it was already.
Huh?
Wet tyres are usable at all tracks. Visibility is always a problem for these cars in the wet due mainly to their aerodynamic design principles – including on inters and even on slicks.
And what do you mean by raceable? These cars are barely raceable at the best of times, and actually improve substantially as the track and tyres get wetter.
That has unfortunately become a sad truth in modern F1, just like it has in the wider world of law.
It doesn’t matter who is wrong or right, nor what the actions and consequences are – only who makes the most compelling argument (almost always determined by how much money they spend on their legal team).
AlexS
17th November 2024, 15:21
Colapinto crashed because he floored the pedal in wet condition, had not to do with SC or the unreasonable conditions.
MacLeod (@macleod)
14th November 2024, 8:14
An well written comment!
SPArtacus
15th November 2024, 0:44
Agreed. OP’s comment was pretty spot on. Agreed with 99.9% of it.
Leeroy
16th November 2024, 10:59
#BINGBACKMASSI
MikePrice
13th November 2024, 9:00
In my view Wittich’s time in f1 has been as disastrous if not more so than Masi’s. Whiting was irreplaceable and so f1 needed a revamp. Masi after his debut season did not deliver a revamp on how race direction worked and ended up tangled in a very public title fight, then Wittich and Freitas for whatever reason, swapped jobs at times, Freitas had less races but you only need a bad one and Japan proved a challenging race as he got the axe, shame on one hand as f1 could do with some of wec’s ideas. Japan was also good for Wittich in the sense that it deflected away from some of his puzzling decisions. The timing of yellows, sc red flags and mishaps with the presence of track marshalls or equipment on track kept being a problem. Luckily for Wittich red bull’s dominance did not shine a light on some of these events but this season was enough to highlight some mishaps and end Wittich’s tenure. Race direction may get flak from stewards’ decisions but there is no doubt Wittich also failed to employ any sense and predictability to an f1 weekend. Lastly Wittich was not completely anonymous either, he was just lucky to not end up in the middle of a super tight championship, also as a character he was on tv a couple times I remember listening to him live in one practice session, he was opinionated but unfortunately it felt like he learned nothing with Masi. I’m going to ignore the rabbit hole of track limits but it is a case and point of how he failed.
I must admit I celebrated the news of his departure, hopefuly this time around we get some common sense back into race direction and a thorough revamp of procedures, they have the winter to work on clarifications and predict f1 team workarounds.
Blue flags
13th November 2024, 9:18
I rejoice! Wittich was lucky he did not get a 21′ season but even with this less intense title battle, it brought enough bad attention upon his job, which has been questionable. He made the mistake of having recovery vehicles on track before Freitas suzuka blunder, he has also failed spectacularly with track limits. Massive problems with the handling of yellow periods and misconduct, very slow on safety car and red flag deployment, inconsistency in regards to decision making, we can’t tell what is a vsc what is a safety car. Procedural failures like Brazil. List goes on really.
MichaelN
13th November 2024, 9:22
The FIA race director is best served by being made less important. There is still a lot of cleaning up to do following the twenty plus years that Whiting ruled F1 has his personal series. The race director’s job, stripped down to its core responsibilities, should not be a topic of discussion at every race weekend. Nobody talks about the clerk of the course either. That’s how it should be.
No clever interpretation of rules, no gamesmanship, no incidental exceptions to rules, and no enforcement dependent on how big or small a team is.
Wittich did a decent job, much better than those who came before, but there’s still room for improvement.
notagrumpyfan
13th November 2024, 10:12
Seems like a role for AI.
And maybe keep an MC for the pre-race show.
Coventry Climax
13th November 2024, 10:41
God forbid we ever go the way of putting any judiciary organisation, any level, into the hands of those who turn the knobs on what the AI servers are being fed with. Plus, who would judge such a system and what would be your appeal options then?
But I know of quite a few presidents and at least one president to be, that would really love to get the opportunity.
Then, where specifically F1 is concerned:
The FiA feeding an F1 stewardry and decision making AI system? That most likely just yields even more mess.
pcxmac (@pcxmac)
13th November 2024, 18:36
it’s already being used … It’s called Lavendar
pcxmac (@pcxmac)
13th November 2024, 18:37
I mean, its only been 80 years since IBM tried it.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
14th November 2024, 22:12
AI in recruitment processes is strictly limited in the EU, precisely because it has been shown to be partial in ways that weren’t expected on purchase (usually reflecting the biases of the programmers and the training sets used).
Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
13th November 2024, 9:47
Masi was overworked, why can’t the position be held by two people instead of rotating them? like a Director and a Vice-director
notagrumpyfan
13th November 2024, 10:14
There are others around.
But in many cases those who end up being overworked are (also) poor delegators.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
14th November 2024, 22:10
@fer-no65 There already is a vice-director, who in their own way is as overworked as the director.
There’s probably scope for those two roles to be done by 5-6 people.
Coventry Climax
13th November 2024, 10:26
Do not underestimate the powers of those that would welcome full control over the decisions normally and formerly made by the race director. That starts out by stressing how near impossibly difficult the task is, such that a complete overhaul is necessary.
Let us not forget it is the FiA themselves, who have made the job as difficult as it is these days, with arguably the thickest, most complex and most badly worded rulebook any sports has ever seen, and who have allowed third parties in into the rulemaking process.
SteveP
13th November 2024, 21:03
As a, possibly, amusing exercise, take the 2024 sporting regulations and do a search/replace changing any incidence of “may” for the word “shall”
If you find any incidences of the change not making a rule more explicit and better a fit for the spirit of the overall rules, let me know. With that done, I’m sure the rules can have a lot of excess wordage removed.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
14th November 2024, 22:09
Given that we now have 3 race directors in a row who apparently misinterpreted the word “shall” (each in a different context), it’s starting to look like every instance of the word “shall” makes the regulations as practised deviate more from the regulations as written. The regulations need to be followed for this measure to be helpful.
Pierre Ocon
13th November 2024, 13:02
Wittich made me miss Masi. Happy days as an f1 fan, just too many mistakes. Slow yellows, slow VSC, slow red flags, recovery vehicles on track, track limits, procedural errors.
Hotbottoms (@hotbottoms)
13th November 2024, 15:14
In my opinion, the issue wasn’t just that Masi made a wrong decision; it was that he made a decision that was unprecedented in two ways. First, only some drivers were allowed to unlap, whereas previously, it was all or none. Second, the safety car was brought in on the same lap as the unlapping, whereas before, this happened on the following lap.
I don’t want to debate whether these decisions went against regulations. In my view, they clearly did, but others may disagree. Still, making two unprecedented decisions that (at the very least) pushed regulatory boundaries, especially at such a critical moment in the championship, showed very poor judgment. It signaled a willingness to play a more significant role than he should have. After that, it’s hard to continue as race director.
Many say Masi was under too much pressure from Horner and Wolff, each trying to sway him in their favor. But I believe Masi put himself in that position by showing he could be easily influenced. If Horner and Wolff hadn’t tried to pressure him, they would have risked giving the other team an advantage.
As for Wittich, I’m more puzzled by his dismissal. Yes, there may have been some issues with poorly timed red flags and similar mistakes, but those are things a race director can improve through trial and error. I doubt they’ll ever find a director who makes every decision perfectly.
I agree with this view 100%.
Red Andy (@red-andy)
13th November 2024, 16:14
I think it was the opposite. It was about trying to reduce the role race control played in the outcome, by ensuring the race was decided on track. You can argue whether that, and/or the way Masi went about it, was misguided. But I think it came from a place of not wanting the officials to become the story (which didn’t work, obviously). You can see that too in the stewards’ decision to not get involved in the lap one incident where Hamilton went off track and didn’t give the place back.
SteveP
13th November 2024, 21:10
That would be because the regulations are quite clear, that is what you do:- have an SC in-lap after lapped drivers have unlapped themselves. Masi threw the torn remnants of that rule to the four winds
anon
13th November 2024, 21:14
@hotbottoms the suggestion is that the drivers had been complaining about the way in which Wittich was handling the driver briefings as more of a case of a teacher lecturing young children, whereas others had taken a more collaborative approach and allowed more discussions between the drivers and officials.
It also appears to be tied in to one of the complaints in the letter from the drivers to Sulayem, which was “Further, our members are adults. They do not need to be given instructions by the media about matters as trivial as the wearing of jewellery or underpants.” – Wittich was apparently lecturing the drivers about jewellery and fireproof underpants in the driver briefings.
That said, it’s been suggested that some of Wittich’s behaviour may have been due to Sulayem leaning on him to act in that way towards the drivers. It’s therefore been suggested that Sulayem is using Wittich as a scapegoat by directing the criticism from the drivers onto Wittich instead, and then firing Wittich as an act of appeasement.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
14th November 2024, 22:06
@hotbottoms Completely ignoring the regulations regarding timing, in such a way that technically the entire Brazilian Grand Prix is possible to invalidate in court (French criminal courts, not just FIA/arbitration ones) on safety grounds for anyone who feels like it, on the other hand, might not be something that the FIA felt could risk happening twice.
Dex
13th November 2024, 23:41
Try working construction, then understand…
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
14th November 2024, 22:01
I think the situation would be eased enormously by doing the following, in no particular order:
– Shorten the calendar. The FIA does not appear to be capable of running F1 when it has over 20 races, stop forcing it to do so. (Bonus: this makes each round matter more important, is less stressful to non-FIA staff and makes it easier to have a sustainable calendar). If sprints are to be kept, each should count as one race.
– Get the FIA president away from F1. If the president cannot stay away, at least provide enough distance so that a relationship of trust can be developed. That can’t happen if the FIA president mistakes the role as one involving sticking medals round people’s heads every other weekend, for example. Delegate the job to dignitaries or unsung volunteers, if a president’s medal must be issued.
– Get half a dozen of the senior race directors together, along with half a dozen top-notch administrators from outside F1, give them a section of the F1 rulebook and ask them to circle all the ambiguous bits. Let them discuss their work together afterwards, so that the process of trying to reach consensus can be seen. Any conversations that sound weird, awkward or just plain ridiculous are signs the regulation has a problem that needs fixing. Write down the learnings, then give the entire rulebook plus those learnings to a top-notch admin assistant and ask them to make the regulations so they do not have the flaws discovered during the aforementioned exercise.
– For any regulation where it should be possible for people to tell what happened without the aid of an entire stewarding toolkit (overtaking priorities, crashes, track limits…), take the revised regulation from the previous exercise, get the grid kids for a race together and ask them to judge some past incidents using that rulebook in teams of four, with the sort of footage a regular viewer might reasonably have. Anything they can’t judge within 4 minutes, cannot judge with reasonable consistency, require more than 1 clarification question or end up providing a ridiculous result, needs to go back to the teams and regulation-setting part of the FIA to rework. If a group of grid kids can manage to judge it consistently, then pressured race directors, busy stewards, distracted journalists and children learning the sport also stand a good chance of judging the matter well. This will reduce the amount of controversy that occurs in F1, reduce the chronic element of pressure on the race director and give the race director a better chance of making good calls.
– Make it clear to the race director, competitors and everyone with authority over the race director that safety must come first. If in doubt, rule through the prism of safety. At least then, it’s possible to rely on being able to explain the decision to the people who depend on it later.
– Also make clear that where the regulations say something must happen (and safety would not be compromised in the process), that is how it must be. This will avoid a lot of legal liabilities, as well as reducing the amount of controversy and pressure in acute situation. It won’t go away entirely because no sport is ever completely without disputes, however it does give the race director and F1 itself a fighting chance.
– The FIA needs to find better ways of supporting its race directors. Delegation probably is part of the answer, but so is learning to manage the race directors properly. One cannot govern a powerful individual, or even a powerful group of individuals such as five people carrying out the functions of a race director between them, as if it/they is/are a cog in a factory.
S
15th November 2024, 8:45
1. Doesn’t make any difference.
2. The FIA President (Todt) staying away from F1 was the cause of most of these problems.
3. The rules are intentionally flexible to account for the near-infinite range of incidents that can or could arise. ‘Fixing’ it too rigidly will only make it appear more inconsistent.
4. Get random kids to determine the stewarding standards? Are you for real?
5. Sure, but how much safety? Cancel the entire event? It’s still always going to be judgement call and reasonable compromise is essential.
6. If you are suggesting that the Race Director and stewards have ultimate control and final say over the running of the event, then what is the change you are proposing?
7. It think what you are trying to say is that the FIA should back their own staff – which they do already. They even did after the final race in 2021, only for certain stakeholders to pressure them to change their mind.
F1 is all a power game, and unfortunately, the money F1 makes has become far more powerful than F1 itself.