It seems as though not a race goes by these days without talking about track limits and already it’s become the hot topic at the German Grand Prix.
The FIA had previously said they’d abandon track limit enforcement in Hockenheim to allow for better racing but just a day later, they’ve already changed their mind… as seems to be the case with every half-arsed rule they come up with these days.
F1 teams and drivers had gone into the weekend believing that track limits didn’t apply, so unsurprisingly the high-speed Turn 1 at the Hockenheim was abused almost 100 times during Free Practice 1, with 14 of them from Max Verstappen.
Race control: Turn 1 sensors recorded 93 track limit violations in FP1. Max Verstappen was responsible for 14 of them. #AMuS #GermanGP #F1
— Tobi Grüner (@tgruener) July 29, 2016
It was a surprise then when in Free Practice 2 the FIA had been recording such violations and that F1 race director Charlie Whiting was now implying a ‘three-strikes’ limit for Turn 1.
“During P1 many drivers appeared to make little or no effort to stay on the track on the exit of turn one,” said Whiting. “Therefore, for P2 and P3 any driver who is judged to have left the track three times at turn one will be reported to the stewards for not having made every reasonable effort to use the track.”
Ferrari Team Principal, Maurizio Arrivabene was particularly pissed off about the FIA once again changing the sport’s regulations whenever the hell they feel like it.
“We had nothing to do with it,” said the Ferrari boss. “Yesterday we discussed that we will try to have a ‘wild’ weekend because this track has adequate run off areas. But then they ended up recording everyone who went over the white lines as if we hadn’t agreed anything yesterday. So we have gone to Bernie.”
Stay tuned then to see if the rules know doubt changed again for Free Practice 3. *sigh*