There were many controversial episodes of the first – historic – Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. Verstappen’s white-arm defenses in braking, the collision between the two title contenders, the rain of Safety Car and red flags that favored one or the other team from time to time. Many of these situations were scrutinized by the race management and led to two penalties against the young Red Bull star, who was punished with a total of 15 seconds of penalty in the race. However, another episode went unnoticed: theevident slowdown operated by Valtteri Bottas at the moment of the entrance of the first Safety Car, following the accident of Mick Schumacher and then transformed into a red flag.
At that moment, Mercedes’ plan was to make a double pit stop, with Hamilton and Bottas. To guarantee himself a safety margin on the operation, without risking being overtaken by Verstappen if he too came back to change tires, the Finn from Mercedes knowingly lifted his foot off the accelerator a lot, effectively blocking the Red Bull rider behind him.
A maneuver at the limit of the regulation. In fact, under the Safety Car regime, point 39.5 of the sporting regulations states that “No car can be driven in an unnecessarily slow, erratic way or in a way that could be considered potentially dangerous to other drivers or any other person at any time while the Safety Car is on track.” The evaluation is therefore discretionary. However, that Bottas slowed down well beyond what the delta-time required, is confirmed by the same radio messages between the black-silver box and the driver from Nastola.
Mercedes: “Safety Car. Safety Car. Keeps the delta positive. Stay safe on the delta ”.
Mercedes: “So, box, box. Stay very safe on the delta ”.
Bottas: “Received”.
Mercedes: “Lewis 2.5 ahead. 3 [secondi] come on”.
Mercedes: Lewis 4 seconds ahead.
Mercedes: “6 second gap”.
Mercedes: “Check the balance”.
Bottas: “The balance is good”.
Mercedes: “Lewis 7 seconds ahead”.
Mercedes: “Now 6 seconds ahead, you’re getting a little closer”.
Mercedes: “Gap 5 seconds. Another 5 seconds. Adapt the break balance at the entrance. Gap 6 seconds “.
At this point the Mercedes # 77 enters the pit lane. In fact, Bottas lost about 3.5 seconds to Hamilton in the Safety Car regime. This allowed him to not having to ‘wait’ in line behind his boxmate. The ‘clever’ obviously was not appreciated by Verstappen and by Red Bull.
Verstappen: “Valtteri is driving extremely out of pace”.
Red Bull: “I agree. It’s a fuck-a-thon. Absolutely a plug for the c * lo “.
Red Bull: “Stay out Max. Stay out”.
Verstappen: “What he did shouldn’t be allowed.”
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