Mercedes drivers George Russell and Lewis Hamilton hailed progress being made with the FIA over Formula 1 racing guidelines following a meeting in Qatar.
Ahead of the Qatar Grand Prix, the 20 F1 drivers met with F1 officials to continue debating racing guidelines.
The debate has stemmed from penalties dished out across the United States Grand Prix at the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas.
A particular flashpoint was Max Verstappen going unpunished for his wheel-to-wheel contest with Lando Norris in Austin, which saw both drivers run off the circuit but only the latter being penalised.
A week later in Mexico City, Verstappen was handed two separate 10-second time penalties for forcing Norris off of the circuit twice within the same lap.
“I mean to be honest it was pretty productive,” Russell, a Director of the Grand Prix Drivers’ Association (GPDA) said of the meeting with the FIA in Qatar on Thursday.
“I think we all agree the guidelines, they don’t need massive changes. I think we just need the odd sentence removed or adjusted.
“Everybody is clear with what happened in Austin, what should have been a penalty. What happened in Mexico was rightly penalised. And generally speaking over the course of the year I think the decisions have been pretty good.
“It was just probably Austin that was the outlier.
“The main discussion was mainly about overtaking.
“I think a lot of drivers are aligned that if you are the overtaking car on the inside, rule number one is you have to be able to stay on the circuit.
“If you’re able to stay on the circuit, you are in your right to run the driver wide, as it has been for all of us since go-karts.
“And we also concluded that most of these issues are down to the circuits.
“We spoke about a number of issues in Austin. I think a lot of the overtakes wouldn’t have even been attempted had there been gravel there.”
Lewis Hamilton: FIA ‘moving in the right direction’ over racing guidelines
Hamilton shared Mercedes team-mate Russell’s views on the racing guidelines.
Particularly, Hamilton agreed upon how the issues stem largely from the differing nature of each and every circuit on the F1 GP calendar.
Moreover, the seven-time champion hailed the motorsport governing body for hearing the drivers out.]
“What’s great is just acknowledging the FIA and the stewards taking the time to sit down with us and let you go through it,” Hamilton said.
“That’s the first time we’ve actually probably had that meeting in a while at least. You know, things have changed, but that’s the best meeting I would say we have.
“It’s very complex because there’s so many different, all these different corners, so many different scenarios. They don’t have an easy job at all.
“I think it helps us all sitting with them, having a discussion of what, because in their minds, this year it’s been, or it has been better in terms of consistency, but obviously everyone wants it to be perfect.
“But until you have those discussions for them to fully understand what, from our race, from where we’re sitting, from where we’re fighting, what we’re fighting for and what we think is right or wrong in certain scenarios, it’s good for them to hear and for us to work on real clear guidelines.
“So that also from the car, you know exactly what you have.
“We’re just working away at it together. I think just from that meeting, we’re definitely moving in the right direction.”
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