Welcome to Tuesday’s edition of the RaceFans round-up.
Comment of the day
Could F1 speed up the process of moving lapped cars to the tail of the Safety Car queue by ordering them to allow the queue to pass them? Or restart the race without letting lapped cars catch up to the back of the queue? @Renee points out the idea would create unfair situations:
Say you’re in seventh hot on the tail of a slower car in sixth and the leader arrives to lap you, like we’ve seen before with Lewis and Max. You let the leader by and then the Safety Car comes out.
So when you are allowed to un-lap before the restart, but are still half a lap away when the flag goes green, you won’t ever have the chance to fight for sixth or even see the back of him. So it kind of ruins the race for certain cars, through no fault of their own. And the race should be as fair as possible, and not only for the leaders.
@Renee
Happy birthday!
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On this day in motorsport
- Born today in 1941: Dave Walker, who ended his only full season of F1 in 1972 point-less while his team mate Emerson Fittipaldi won the world championship
- 35 years ago today Gerhard Berger was first across the line in Canada but a one-minute penalty relegated him to fourth. Team mate Ayrton Senna won ahead of Nelson Piquet and Nigel Mansell.
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Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
10th June 2025, 0:39
COTD is spot on. But for.me the problem is elsewhere. In that same scenario seventh placed guy just.let by the leaders which are fighting hard for the win. And bang, the safety car comes out. But it takes so long that we only get 3 laps left of racing instead of 5.
That’s a fight for the win potentially gone. And I’m sorry but I rather watch more laps of leaders fighting than a 6th place struggle.
Is it unfair on the 7th? To an extent ,yes. But something’s gotta give. And those people were lapped for a reason, so tough luck. So it’s not as unfair as it’d seem.
Jere (@jerejj)
10th June 2025, 7:10
While lapping usually happens for a reason, a driver can’t do anything about that if a given car is too slow to remain on the lead lap on merit throughout a race distance, not to mention sometimes lapping happens due to magnifying circumstances such as an early puncture or excessively long pit stop.
Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
10th June 2025, 10:51
So? what’s your point?
Jeanrien (@jeanrien)
10th June 2025, 11:46
Funny timing for such debate as Le Mans is getting closer as the wrong timing can set you one SC apart or in F1 standards, a lap down.
SC is artificial in nature and except asking drivers to recreate the delta they had before, it will be unfair so maybe let’s focus on having it unfair for the shorter possible duration and maximise on track action. Agree with @fer-no65.
And if there was 10sec and 2 lapped cars between first and second, having 2 sec and 2 lapped cars is still a bargain.
Yes there will be gains and losses, but let’s not overcomplicate things and there are more unfair situations to address first that have easier/fairer solutions (free red flag tire change for instance, could be replaced with a fixed delta time added to last timing).
LosD (@losd)
10th June 2025, 12:39
If the 6th and 7th in your example were fighting for position, and 7th is lapped just before the SC, he’s now a lap down on 6th instead of a few seconds, even though their were evenly matched.
That is extremely unfair, and dropping backmarkers down affects the race much more than a few laps spent unlapping them in most cases. Maybe a little less this season, where there is actually some amount fighting at the front, but in most other recent seasons, there’s a much bigger chance that the only interesting fights in the race would be broken by this silly idea.
If anything, do the “drop back and count up”, even though 7th would be given a small advantage (which is tiny, especially compared to being dropped by a lap)
Roger Ayles (@roger-ayles)
10th June 2025, 13:59
@fer-no65 The drivers fighting for 6th/7th and down are just as much in the race as the leaders and in some cases you could have the championship contenders down in those places so they could also on occasion have title consequences. I mean the championship has been decided by half a point before and by drivers finishing in lower points places in a final race decider.
Not to mention how a point for a mid-field team can end up been of vital importance at the end of the year when the prize money is handed out based off constructors championship positions.
A race isn’t just about the leaders and never should be just about the leaders. We have 20 (Next year 22) cars and drivers on track and a driver fighting over a lower points position or even a bit further down the order should be seen as been just as much a part of the race, Be treated just as fairly and not ever be simply ignored just because some ‘fans’ think everyone behind the leader/s should simply be ignored or are fine to just disadvantage as they aren’t doing anything important.
Mooa42
10th June 2025, 1:12
RE: QoTD I agree it should be fair for all.
They could deploy a second safety car in front of the main safety car. All the lapped traffic would line up behind while the repair/recovery work is being done. The 2nd safety car would then run at a faster pace, and dictate the pace around the recovery/repair section of the track. If they make it to the back of the pack the 2nd safety car can peel off. Even if they don’t make it back of the pack at least they will be in order and it should be quicker to get back to racing.
The only unfair bit then is the person who is last of the unlapped runners, their tyres will be colder and could be under immediate threat from the first of the lapped cars.
Jere (@jerejj)
10th June 2025, 7:07
I also like your suggestion, although I don’t see anything unfair towards the last unlapped driver especially as the driver in that position on a given occasion has never actually ended up under threat in reality, not to mention the temp difference is relatively marginal anyway.
SteveP
10th June 2025, 7:40
Then scrap the physical safety car and use a VSC with variable delta.
Either bunch the cars up, if you need a large gap between the rear car and the lead car so that debris can be cleared etc.
or let the cars run at normal speed except in the sector approaching the incident.
Whatever speed they run at during the incident clearance can be raised incrementally when the track is clear – picture yourself watching the race on twitfacetube and hitting the playback speed controls, but finer tuned speeds.
Unless you actually like seeing the safety car circulating for many laps with a train of open wheel cars following on cold tyres.
Jere (@jerejj)
10th June 2025, 9:30
SteveP I’d be okay with stopping the practice of a physical SC neutralization altogether & instead using VSC with a more variable & strict delta, depending on circumstances.
Red-flagging could remain the maximum neutralization method for the most severe situations.
Nitin Patel (@nitin24)
10th June 2025, 1:34
Let the safety car take all lead lap cars through the pit lane (assuming it’s safe) and let the lapped cars go around and observe double yellows near the scene of the incident. This can be done fairly quickly on the second or third safety car lap (after everyone has pitted) and should get things squared away quickly
Jere (@jerejj)
10th June 2025, 7:05
An alternative viable suggestion.
Euro Brun (@eurobrun)
10th June 2025, 8:16
The problem is the phrase “observe double yellows”. We’ve seen F1 drivers observing these for years. A gentle lift off the throttle for half a second, or getting caught out by the car in front legitimately slowing, when they were only gonna roll off a few kph.
Drivers can’t be trusted enough with slowing for certain sectors
MichaelN
10th June 2025, 8:50
That is because Whiting codified the slowing down part into tenths of a second.
It’s easy to solve. DSQ people who are not serious about the flag. They will learn really quickly.
Jere (@jerejj)
10th June 2025, 9:31
@eurobrun a separate VSC delta for the relevant mini-sector would suffice.
Jordi Casademunt (@casjo)
10th June 2025, 3:02
The Madring thing will never stop making me cringe.
SCs will always be controversial. Maybe they should just have the cars pull into the pitlane while there’s workers on the track, then go behind the SC and restart the race. At least they would waste fewer laps, even if the time loss is unavoidable.
Adrian Hancox (@ahxshades)
10th June 2025, 11:17
So red flags instead of safety cars then?
Jere (@jerejj)
10th June 2025, 7:05
COTD is spot-on. Keeping things as they are or speeding up the process by allowing unlapping early on into an SC period with a VSC delta requirement for the mini-sector where a car recovery process is ongoing is the fairest solution.
Marko is rather positive that nothing could happen over the next two rounds that would lead to at least one more penalty point & even following the Austrian GP weekend when he’s set to lose two penalty points (as long as he doesn’t gain any by that point), beyond that day he wouldn’t lose further until the post-Mexico City GP day, so still close to an automatic ban.
I think most of those 80,000 people are Madrid & or otherwise Spanish natives in the end.
Roy Beedrill
10th June 2025, 7:16
Re:COTD
Instead of sending lapped cars chasing the leaders for a whole lap, can we just send them to the back of the pack in their respective order and then just remove the “-1 lap” from the timing standings? It’s 2025 you know, it can be done electronically, automatically and I’m sure if it’s done right, it can be reliable. And even in a case of a rare malfunction of this system we still have a whole room of stewards who will finally have a chance to do something useful (even Warwick). Oh, wait, but it’s exactly what Japanese Super GT series have been doing for years already!
Euro Brun (@eurobrun)
10th June 2025, 8:17
Oh no. F1 couldn’t be seen to copy a logical idea from a sub category!
MichaelN
10th June 2025, 8:52
But why give back a lap? That is essentially a 90 second time penalty to everyone who wasn’t lapped. Why? Move the lapped cars to the back if the goal is to remove them from the competitive cars, but just leave it at that.
Jere (@jerejj)
10th June 2025, 9:41
Roy Beedrill Altering the 1L (or 2L & or 3L on some occasions) to a time gap relative to the leader might be doable technology-wise.
However, the physically lapped drivers would have a fuel usage advantage over those who’ve remained on the lead lap the whole race by that point & therefore, have a competitive advantage over the rest, especially in the case of being in consecutive positions between the last points-scoring positions & the highest non-scoring positions.
Ultimately, the main point of starting the unlapping practice during SC neutralizations & full-race suspensions in 2012 was to ensure that all remaining drivers would be roughly equal in fuel usage instead of some having physically driven around a circuit one time less than the rest, which won’t change regardless of what’s done with the timing system.
Btw, I’ve so far watched two Super GT races (one in the last two campaigns each, coincidently both in Okayama), & the fuel usage matter is a bit different for that series due to two different category levels sharing a circuit with effectively their own respective races.
Roger Ayles (@roger-ayles)
10th June 2025, 13:52
The problem with that is your then giving them a 1 lap fuel and tyre advantage which in some situations can be a pretty decent performance advantage.
For example having 1 lap more fuel on a circuit like Singapore that is not only very high in terms of fuel usable but also the longest race of the season in terms of time could allow a driver to use a few more revs which for as small as it may seem could be the few MPH difference between been able to overtake or not.
And with tyres we have seen races featuring higher degredation where a tyre can be a tenth or more slower with a lap more wear and that again could be the difference between getting a better run onto the main overtaking zone or not.
James Brickles (@brickles)
10th June 2025, 9:57
Not necessarily. Yes, lapped runners would’ve covered less distance than leaders, but the time spent on the circuit would be the same.
James Brickles (@brickles)
10th June 2025, 9:58
[In response to Jere above]
PeteB (@peteb)
10th June 2025, 9:59
COTD makes a good point. Ultimately, Safety Cars reset the race and it will always be unfair for someone. Depending on what has happened recently, people will complain about it because it’ll always cause problems.
There isn’t really a good solution to this that is fair to everyone and can be done quickly. The best solution I can think of is to let them unlap much earlier but enforce VSC conditions through the affected section. The FIA can speak directly to the cars involved throughout the lap to inform them of any marshals or vehicles on the track and they can be caught up by the time the track is clear.
Electroball76
10th June 2025, 11:11
Bring everyone into the pits.
Wait for the obstruction to be cleared.
Release each car individually using the same time gaps they had when the racing was paused.
RBAlonso (@rbalonso)
10th June 2025, 12:47
For me the safety car issue is pretty simple, if it will take more than 10 mins then red flag it. Allow for a rolling start if it is a SC Red rather than a full red.
During an under 10 SC, put the cars from first in race order and have the lapped cars do one lap under the SC. The lapped cars then satisfy the race distance, and it takes one lap to bring them back in line. As those lapped cars enter the pits the light goes green and the front of the queue pick up the safety car. No one is out of position or benefits from hot tyres at the back of the queue.
The only issue I can see is drivers completing pit stops but in theory they should arrive in the pits and exit as usual. So that pit lane queue may have to move past the red light and onto the exit apron. In any event, it can’t be beyond the wit of man to stop 10 min SC periods.