F1 Fanatic

I’ve just been looking at the penalties available to the stewarts during a grand prix weekend.

http://www.formula1.com/inside_f1/rules_and_regulations/sporting_regulations/8683/fia.html

16.3 The stewards may impose any one of three penalties on any driver involved in an Incident:
a) A drive-through penalty. The driver must enter the pit lane and re-join the race without stopping;
b) A ten second time penalty. The driver must enter the pit lane, stop at his pit for at least ten seconds and then re-join the race.
c) a drop of any number of grid positions at the driver’s next Event.

No mention of a “5 second” penalty.

Did they just pull that one out of the sky??

I think its part of there “wheel of fortune” stle penalty awardance, where to deceide the time penalty the guest driver steward just throws a dart at a dartboard and thats the time penalty they award…
I thought post race penaltys were meant to be 30 seconds?

Keith used this video before on one of his articles but kinda fits this situation aswell.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBhrpD1x8zo

I think it was done because the drivers where so far into the lap it was difficult to make the delta time!

I have heard this said a few times as if it exonerates the drivers involved. But, I believe each driver is given an individual delta time, so it would make sense that this time was based on their current position on the track (as those of you who watched the BBC’s pre-race show will know, the cars’ positions can be determined to an accuracy of somewhat less than a metre). So if a driver was quite close to the end of a sector when the SC was deployed, they would obviously be expected to have a faster delta time than someone who had just started a sector.

If that’s the case then there’s no real escaping the fact that nine drivers were illegally speeding under the safety car, presumably knowingly. So hitting them with a five-second penalty each is a complete joke, especially since it actually disadvantaged only two drivers, who were presumably no more guilty than any of the others.

The Schumacher incident revealed that the ISC (Art. 151 I think) points out that the stewards can give a time penalty of their choosing depending on the gravity of the situation. They only found out AFTER MSC had been penalized, and fans pointed out that this clause could’ve been used on Schumi instead.

Well, yes. Especially after I read this from Alianora La Canta, our resident F1 rules expert at Sidepodcast.

http://formula1home.com.au/forum/weblog_entry.php?e=986

Apparently, this infringement is NOT covered by that clause in the ISC.

So… yes.

Thanks for mentioning the ISC there Journeyer. I also thought maybe the FIA had a chat with the Stewards after Monaco and instructed them, that in some cases they would not have to keep to the 3 options in the Sporting regulations but could apply a penalty in the broader scope of the ISC.

But from your second post i am wondering, weather that is possible. Is there anything explicitly stated in the ISC (limiting when to use them or define the jurisdiction of the SR)?
And Alianora La Canta is right about the part where nobody thought it nessicary to inform the fans (the teams might have been informed descreetly) about a change in views on this by the FIA.