F1: Mercedes appeals Verstappen's win, contest safety car procedure in last lap | Hacker News Reader

F1: Mercedes appeals Verstappen's win, contest safety car procedure in last lap

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29 pointsthe-dude25 comments

Hamilton had the faster car today so I don't think the terrible first lap non-call would have affected the race. Mercedes did a terrible job with tire management today - they just needed to cover off Verstappen's tire changes and they would have been fine, but they failed. The way that final lap turned out was super exciting for fans, but the outcome was pre-ordained given the age of Hamilton's tires.

The way the race officials communicated the restart was confusing and terrible. Masi probably needs to be fired for this.

But we probably all need to be talking about Perez and the amazing, selfless job that he did as a teammate for Verstappen today and all weekend.

Perez is the New Mexican minister of defense

I think it worked out as it was supposed to. Mercedes could have pitted during SC and got fresh tires, they decided not to, thought they had it wrapped up. F1 is a team sport and Mercedes can't stand they made an error.

FIA made two poor decisions, first allowing Hamilton to keep his advantage after he goes off track. Then they allowed the odd restart with SC. To me it evened out.

Of course, Mercedes will appeal, they can't stand to lose. And if they had won, I would expect RedBull to appeal that stupid call at the beginning of the race. Either one deserves the crown.

Congratulations Max!

If Merc had pitted Lewis, Max would have stayed out and gained P1. At that stage Merc didn't know if the race would have finished under the safety car. They'd have looked equally foolish if it had as they'd have looked to have given up P1 for no reason.

This isn't how Formula One should be. This isn't how a Championship should be decided. The 2021 season wasn't a sport, it was a show.

The Race Director didn't follow the rules today - I've read them. Either all lapped cars should've been let through, or none. If none, the race could've gotten underway with two laps to go. If all, then there should've been a lap afterwards to get those cars catch up. That's what the rules say.

Mercedes protested the race, but not against Max. They protested for clarity from the FIA over what happened and why. They want to know why this race turned into a show, to get as much racing as possible, disregarding safety and the rules.

The result of the protest didn't explain that - in fact, it made it worse. It created precedent that means the Race Director can decide whatever rules he wants. This isn't right.

With millions of new watchers around the world, motorsport as a whole lost today. I don't understand why any new fans would want to watch our sport after what happened today because it was a shambles of inconsistency and incompetence.

2021 has been a season of incredible racing, but unfortunately a season of incredibly bad leadership and regulation too. Formula One needs to change in the future. We need a sport where the regulators are consistent and stick to the rules. There's no point racing if the sport isn't fair.

Many people dedicate their lives to Formula One. It's a massive disservice to all those working in and around F1 (drivers, mechanics, management, marketing, support, journalists, photographers, staff, pundits, and feeder series staff) to have races where this happens.

The events of this season will be remembered throughout history, and must not be allowed to happen next year.

Congratulations to Max for winning the Drivers Championship, and Mercedes for winning the constructors. But this isn't what Formula One is, and it's a disgraceful decision and a bad day for motorsport. I hope for a better season next year, and I hope that Mercedes' protest appeal holds the FIA accountable for their mistakes today, and throughout the year.

See you in March, F1. Roll on Bahrain. Roll on '22.

> to get as much racing as possible, disregarding safety and the rules

If Toto cared about safety - he wouldn't have demanded from Masi "no safety car" when there was an accident. All they care is them winning the race, they screwed up with tire management, and that's why they lost.

The cycle restarts... The FIA is taking shortcuts with safety (the previous race's new Saudi Arabia track is all walls) and regulations (inconsistent rulings) all to increase the spectacle value.

The only winner here is Liberty Media. There probably will never be hard evidence of their influence on the FIA, but Liberty will want to see more of this next year and lines will be crossed.

I predict (near-)fatal accidents in '22 or '23.

Verstappen deserves this championship, but what a total clusterfuck from the FIA.

If Massa thought he had it bad in 2008, Verstappen is going to have it worse if the result does get overturned. Hamilton had it won if the safety car rules had been followed.

Either way, I'm not happy with how the last few races have had vibes-based rules in order to manufacture drama for the conclusion. The last lap was just one more incident of it.

Could someone decrypt this for me? The article just restates the same thing 3 times without actually explaining to me, a person who doesn't care about racing and can't tell if Verstappen is a person or a car company or both. Also why or why not passing someone is not winning a race.

When there's an accident in F1 you can have a (among other things) a Safety Car deployed.

Due to the extent of the race and the different car performances, cars can have a +1 lap difference. So if a SC is deployed, you can have a situation where you have P1-P19-P20-P2-P3-P4-etc (P == position) (example similar to the actual positioning).

The FIA ordered drivers to pass +1lap drivers, so the physical order of the cars reflected the actual position order. This was controversial. Max (P2 at the time) overpassed five +1lap car. Furthermore, he changed tires for "faster ones". When the race restarted (with just 1 lap to go), he passed Hamilton (P1 at the time) and won the World Drivers Championship.

Why didn't Lewis Hamilton also swap out for better tires? (I did not watch the race.)

It was a gamble for both teams. I think he had more to lose, being P1 with 5 cars between him and VER.

If the safety car stayed out until the end then he would lose the race so he could not do it.

Check out the post on OOTL on Reddit. I would explain now but I need to do something other than typing away about F1

OOTL? Do you have a link? Would love to read more about this.

I didn't know either, but I believe it is Out of the Loop sub-reddit which seems to be an interesting approach to unbiased discussions: https://www.reddit.com/r/OutOfTheLoop/comments/reqivo/what_i...

The FIA has been consistent in being inconsistent during the whole season. Max deserved it but god what a mess they made.

For anybody interested in Formula 1 and the latest developments, I would like to recommend reddit.com/r/formula1

Argh, I was watching the race, and just happened to pull up HN on my phone while making coffee. I try to avoid most news sources on Sunday morning but I figured HN was safe.

That was not a race. It was a mugging. Hamilton had his championship stolen by Michael Masi.

The winner of the race and the championship was solely decided by Masi's choice!

The FIA is rumored to decide within an hour ( this decision is open to appeal, a possibly weeks long process ).

Latest is they decided everything is just fine.

Yeah. Even the GOAT can’t win them all. Verstappen is such an arrogant tool. But that’s likely just a my team your team thing in my end.

All top racing drivers are arrogant tools, as far as I can tell.

Verstappen also isn't actually that bad compared to some, he knows he's probably the fastest driver in the world right now but he's pretty unpretentious if you listen to him just chatting away while doing laps on iRacing (he doesn't stream himself so it has to be him talking to someone else).

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