F1 | More severe penalties in 2024: pilots are against it

Going back a few months, more precisely to the weekend of the Grand Prix of the Americas in Austin, at the end of that weekend there was numerous controversy over George Russell's overtaking of Oscar Piastri outside the limits of the track, for which a penalty of only five seconds.

A sanction not severe enough according to some drivers, given that the advantage derived from overtaking exceeded the five seconds resulting from the penalty. The issue of track limits, however, concerns not only overtaking, but also continuous crossings beyond the white line during the race, generating great confusion.

The rule states that after three infringements, the fourth inflicts a penalty which, until last year, was five seconds, as for overtaking completed beyond the white line. However, starting from this season the FIA ​​is acting more harshly on track limit violations and this new approach has already been noticed during the first two rounds of the season.

During the races in the preparatory categories that accompany Formula 1, drivers who broke the track limit regulations on too many occasions were given a sanction of no more than five seconds, but rather ten, double compared to the past. Formula 2 and Formula 3 share part of the regulations with Formula 1 and, for this reason, the penalties assigned in the preparatory series can also be applied to the top category with the same parameters.

Speaking on this topic, however, Formula 1 drivers considered the increase in the fine to be excessive, underlining the fact that it is now too severe. The new penalty is in fact applied not only to overtaking completed beyond the white line, but also to normal track limits: it is precisely on this last point that the drivers were perplexed by the regulatory change.

“It's difficult to understand from a television how difficult it is from inside the car,” explained George Russell, mentioning how difficult it is for drivers inside the cars to understand where the white line is. Generally those who climb into the cockpit uses the curb and its vibrations to understand where it is, this is not true for all curves and, in some cases, it becomes difficult to find the limit before incurring an infringement.

“You sit so low, you can only see the first 15 centimeters of the tires and the cars come down the track 70 millimeters off the ground, even less at the end of a straight, so we need a curb to feel where we are. In the end , on some tracks there are no track limit problems. There are few circuits where problems from this point of view are encountered. We just need to find a way to solve them”, added the Briton, underlining how much the problem linked to track limits is relating only to part of the world championship circuits.

Detail of a curb

Photo by: Erik Junius

Likewise, Charles Leclerc also underlined that the new sanction is quite severe for the type of infringement committed and that the focus should not have been on strengthening the penalties, but on helping the drivers find a solution to respect the white line .

“I think the main priority should be to fix or at least help to better respect the limits of the track, because at the moment, with the way the white lines are, we don't really see it. I felt like five seconds was already painful enough. Ten seconds there are, in my opinion, too many, it is too severe.”

On the other hand, there are also those, like Lance Stroll, who wanted to underline how this problem could be solved by going in the opposite direction to that followed in recent years: instead of pouring asphalt, the idea would be to reposition the grass or gravel beyond the white line. A solution that does not satisfy everyone, especially the teams, who prefer asphalt since, in the event of going off the track, the car can continue without major difficulties, with a lower risk of incurring some damage.

Following the works undertaken at the beginning of the year, gravel will return to certain areas of the track in Monza, but this does not apply to all the world championship tracks. “We're all pushing and trying to stay within the limits of the track. But I think one of the problems is the track limits. In many of the circuits that we go to throughout the season, I think that if we changed the very nature of many of the tracks, and if we made it easier to stay within the limits of the track, but also perhaps more penalizing if we go outside the limits of the track, for example using gravel and grass, then we would have fewer problems in the beginning”.