F1 Fanatic

Prove it. Prove that your understanding of the intended spirit is the correct interpretation.

The FIA keeps having to change the regulations.

When they banned off-throttle blown diffusers, it was clearly intended that the teams would never be able to use an OTBD again. The FIA made that pretty clear. However, the parts that Red Bull used in Germany clearly created the OTBD effect. It was an off-throttle blown diffuser, it just created the effect in a different way to what was banned. If it had occurred to the FIA that their solution was possible when they first banned OTBDs, they certainly would have banned what Red Bull were doing at the same time.

If the parts Red Bull used were in the spirit of the rules and complied with the intended effect of the rulebook, why did the FIA force them to remove the parts and change the regulations?

here’s an example, @prisoner-monkeys – honest question, just a simple yes or no answer. Let’s set aside this “spirit of the rules” talk for a moment. If my memory serves me right, you are an English teacher. I have no idea what education level you teach at (high school, middle school, uni, etc) but yeah.

Have you ever taught poetry or Shakespeare, in your English classes? Or any such form of interpretable literature?

If yes, have you ever gone through different interpretations that your students did?

@prisoner-monkeys The teams’ duty is to look for loopholes all the time or, in other words, to break the spirit of the rules without breaking the wording of them. FIA’s duty is to close these loopholes as soon as possible. Whack a mole, that’s how F1 goes.

@prisoner-monkeys

Unless you want to try convincing me that Red Bull have somehow accidentally created something that is outside the spirit of the rules and were totally unaware of it until it was brought to their attention

Accidentally? Probably not. But can you prove they were aware of their transgression?

That’s not a very good analogy, because the entire point of what I teach is to teach interpretations of it.

The very fact that you are able to teach various interpretations, on a set of words – is a clue to what I’m saying here.

I’m sure you would have had (generally) your own interpretation of these pieces – be them poems or plays. Let’s say you’re the FIA – the students are your competing teams. Have your students ever come to you with an interpretation that differed from your personal interpretation(s)?

So you say, “but hey – I can teach them my interpretation.”

Yes you can.

Have you ever been in the situation where you explained your own interpretation (heck, explained anything, even) to the class – and they understood 90% of it – but had to re-explain and clarify some parts of it to them?

It’s the exact same situation.

I was in high school once upon a time. I had two English teachers – one in my penultimate year and one in my final year. My penultimate year teacher taught poems/Shakespeare in that, all interpretations are valid, as long as we can back them up.

My final year teacher (Ms. Molly – and she used to say how one day we’d appreciate what she did for us – and I still hate her guts) had a book of interpretations – and I remember once we were discussing this poem about a bird on a tree, and something about the tree only having one leaf left. I don’t remember the poem title off the top of my head. Maybe it sounds familiar to you. I said to the teacher I felt like the bird was clinging to an old hope – and that last leaf was a desperate final plea. She shot me down with “No, that’s wrong Raymond. There is not even a hint of desperation in this,” which shocked me – because of the way I had been taught the last two years.

It’s the same situation. You cannot expect the kids (teams) to have your interpretation exactly identical to their interpretation, especially on the first go. Because, how was I supposed to know that the poem “had no desperation in it,” you know?

@prisoner-monkeys how do the FIA prove that Red Bull have *knowingly* breached the spirit? Emphasis on knowingly.

@prisoner-monkeys
Just to reiterate: so we’re on the same page. I agree that Red Bull are doing it knowingly.

What I’m getting at is no one can PROVE they’re doing it KNOWINGLY

This whole ‘Spirit of the rules’ is tiresome and intangible as it means different things to different people. F1 cars have and always will be designed to a set of regulations and the ‘art’ of the engineer/designer has and always will be to find and exploit the loopholes in the regulations.

It is The FIA’s role to police the regulations and they are free to close these loopholes as and when they are discovered by issuing clarifications. Whether or not they do so is up to them, but to accuse the teams of cheating for doing what they are supposed to do (build the fastest car possible within the ‘stated’ regulations) is a nonsense!

There is nothing wrong with bending the rules, either knowingly or unknowingly, it is whether the rules are broken or not that count!