Red Bull driver Mark Webber has called for less penalties to be handed out by the stewards, describing the current situation as ‘road-car culture’.
The Australian’s comments come on the back of yet another controversial penalty following a collision between Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa, whereby the latter was penalised for causing an ‘avoidable accident’.
“You could argue all day about the rights and wrongs of the latest crash involving Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa but it was a 50-50 incident in my opinion,” wrote Webber in his BBC F1 column.
“The corner they collided at is quite a quick one – fifth gear at about 135mph – so the brakes don’t go on much. It’s very difficult to pass there but Lewis got a good run off Turn Four and got down the inside of Felipe.
“It was the age-old thing. Lewis went for it, Felipe was still going to commit to the corner, then Lewis tried to back off and couldn’t.”
The 35-year-old believes the stewards shouldn’t get involved if the blame is marginal.
“F1 is getting into a bit of a road-car culture with penalties. The attitude seems to be that someone must be to blame when there is an incident,” he added.
“In this case, the stewards thought Felipe could have given Lewis a bit more room and therefore handed him a drive-through penalty.
“Yes, Felipe could have made space for Lewis but, in my view, it wasn’t clear-cut. The drivers have always said that they want the stewards to be consistent – and, to be fair, that’s what they are trying to be.
“If someone’s had an absolute howler, then fine, give them a penalty but sometimes it might be better just to say it was one of those things – what we call in F1 “a racing incident” – and let it go.”
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