2023 Austrian Grand Prix - Spielberg, June 30 - July 02

[AR3-GP]

Simples

[RZS10]

One thing that i still do not understand is why no one seems to be bothered by the sudden change of the penalty system, F1 media/pundits ignored it completely, the teams did not seem to care, no one has talked about it here (well i mentioned it but ...)

From the in race penalty documents (59, 66) we know that 4 offences resulted in a +5s time penalty, another three for a total of 7 resulted in another time penalty of +10s.




During the race following drivers had +5s time penalties (Tsunoda already mentioned above):
Hamilton (Document 58)
Sainz (Doc 61)
Albon (Doc 62)
Gasly (Doc 63)
Sargeant (Doc 67)
Magnussen (Doc 68)

Then, after the race, when AM protested and they realised that the deleted laptime chart did not add up with the number of penalties given they suddenly switched to a completely different system:


So in short, the penalties corresponding to the total number of offences:


Those are the additional penalties given post race.


From the deleted lap time chart, all drivers sorted by total offences, what the penalties would be with the system employed during the race and with the changed system (adding up the in and post race penalties):


* Albon only received ONE additional penalty despite having the same number of offences as Tsunoda (!)

** imho Perez was maybe off in T9 L57
*** Norris was visibly off track on the TV feed at least one more time (L40 T3), maybe even two more times (L41 T10), Hamilton reported several more instances that i could neither verify nor disprove.
With regards to the first one by Norris - does anyone know whether going in too hot (= making a mistake) is a "justifiable reason" or if that phrasing is reserved to being pushed off etc?

I obviously did not take those potentially missed off tracks into account for the changed race result.

FIVE drivers received higher penalties than they would have during the race, why two drivers with the same number of offences have different penalties is also baffling.

This post race change of how they applied penalties had an impact on the race result, the points and therefore potentially the WDC/WCC standings:


Sainz/Ferrari lost 4 points, Alonso/AM gained 2 points, Russell and Hamilton lost/gained 2 points respectively.

Provisional Race Result Doc
Final Race Result Doc

If i made some massive error here or misinterpreted the documents feel free to correct me.
_________________

Another aspect is that many of the drivers would not have even received their first +5s penalties had race control done their job properly.

The twitter thread by 'The_F1Whisperer' already outlined how badly Ocon was disadvantaged.

A quick look at LH's radio communication and his offences:
Hamilton went off track on laps
3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9
the first one was not caught initially, he had 5 noted during the race

He gets informed about having two warnings after L9, before L13, i could not place the radio call exactly, by that time the penalty is inevitable.

On L12 the TV overlay shows Lewis' laptime of 1:10.746 being deleted - that was L5 for leaving the track on L4 T10

L13 he gets the black and white flag.

He receives the penalty on L17.

He did not leave the track a single time after his 2nd warning, had that warning come on time it's almost certain he would not have exceeded track limits after L5 at the latest.

The same is true for Sainz:
He received his black and white flag 30 minutes into the race, his last offence was 5 minutes prior to that, by the time he was shown that flag he had 5 counted, 1 was missed on L3. He did not leave the track after the team informed him about the warnings.

Neither of those two would have received another penalty had all their offences been noted during the race, but because both of them were off at the SC restart one of those offences was missed which apparently is enough to retroactively give them an extra +10s because the system was changed for no apparent reason.

edits were the addition of more links and some rephrasing

[SiLo]

I find it odd that they just made up a new system on the spot and everyone was ok with it.

[atanatizante]

A big banked curve would be pretty cool!

It`s too expensive ... Mr Tilke proposed a reshaped turn 9 and 10 to resemble turn 8 at the Istambul track, thus forcing the drivers to take the inside line of the turns to get the fastest trajectory ...

[RZS10]

I find it odd that they just made up a new system on the spot and everyone was ok with it.

They did not even make it up completely as there have been +10s for the 5th offence before, if they run with that system from the start then it's not an issue.

But here they switched it from in to post race - Tsunoda was the 'precedent' for this race with 7 offences resulting in a total of +15s - why? Only they know ... but it's just really weird that they then went back to the harsher system.

I checked the sporting regulations for any hint as to what the actual "normal" procedure is but there's nothing. It's probably one of those 'behind the scenes' things like the additional factors they will look at in overtaking incidents - or it's, as the regs state, at the "discretion of the stewards" to "impose any one of the penalties" however they want.

It's just the recurrent theme of "consistency" or the lack thereof that is the issue.

And even then, if one were to accept that inconsistency, they penalised drivers for their own incompetence and nothing explains how Tsunoda (+5,+10 in race and +5s post race) and Albon (+5s in race and +10 post race) have different penalties for nine breaches each ...

Albon's in chronological order (worth noting: the random incident # on the very left)


Yuki (they even failed to properly count throughout the document where the red question mark is)


The only difference is that Albon had 2x the T9+T10 combo (incidents 61+33 and 71+62) but those also counted as separate incidents for Norris.

[karana]

...

And even then, if one were to accept that inconsistency, they penalised drivers for their own incompetence and nothing explains how Tsunoda (+5,+10 in race and +5s post race) and Albon (+5s in race and +10 post race) have different penalties for nine breaches each ...

If I'm seeing this right, you have counted the breaches by counting deleted laps. But if there are two breaches in the same lap, you won't see it in the list of deleted laps. So it's possible that Tsunoda had more breaches than Albon.

[Sieper]

You are totally right, and it IS strange that no one objected eventhough some were really disadvantaged by the system chosen. And like you say, the drivers that did get warned adapted their risk. So that is quite unfair to the simply punished not prewarned ones.

Quite weird this went down without objection (seemingly).

Good post!

[RZS10]

...

And even then, if one were to accept that inconsistency, they penalised drivers for their own incompetence and nothing explains how Tsunoda (+5,+10 in race and +5s post race) and Albon (+5s in race and +10 post race) have different penalties for nine breaches each ...

If I'm seeing this right, you have counted the breaches by counting deleted laps. But if there are two breaches in the same lap, you won't see it in the list of deleted laps. So it's possible that Tsunoda had more breaches than Albon.

Nope, i added the excerpts from the list ... counting the deleted laps would have added even more (see "NEXT" in the doc)

[chrisc90]

There's only a small time frame you can protest the result so presumingly the teams have agreed with the decisions from the stewards.

Your right though, why shouldn't multiple excursions off track not be penalised for each instance. All fine and well cutting 1 corner but then forgetting any other excursions off track doesn't add up as your gain an advantage there.

I can only think they they let it slide given teams own analysis of their track limits and either finding themselves open for more penalties than the stewards found, so not worth appealing the decision and losing more places.

I do imagine something will be done about it behind the scenes however.

[chrisc90]

A good watch.

[RZS10]

That's what i believe - it was a mess anyways so they all decided to discuss it behind closed doors without making a bigger deal out of it.

Maybe one more thing ... this is how i read the list: up to item 58 it's all during the race as the time of day is increasing with a few tiny hickups, the ones that follow are post race as the times of day are very random:




This would mean that there were three drivers with 5 offences which did not result in an additional +10s penalty during the race, solidifying the assumption that they just switched the system at a whim.

The odd one out is Gasly, he had all his seven offences within the first 40 minutes of the race, all in the still chronological order of the list (items 10,30,32,35,37,39,43) and yet he only had one +5s penalty.

They either missed it during the race or my interpretation of the table is wrong even though It is consistent with all the other penalties given during the race.

[Willy]

Red Bull ring to have gravel traps next year.