Norris Penalty Sparks Outrage as Wolff Sides with McLaren
Oct.21 - Toto Wolff is siding strongly with McLaren, over the penalty that prevented Lando Norris from narrowing the championship points gap on Sunday.
Norris and championship leader Max Verstappen were locked in a spectacular battle for the last podium place in Austin when the McLaren driver left the track limits as he overtook Verstappen.
It cost Norris a five-second penalty.
"That's the rule," Red Bull's Dr Helmut Marko insists. "We insisted on our rights, generally I prefer the attitude 'Let them race'.
"But we have extended Max's lead by another five points, so we are more than satisfied. I think this is a turning point.
"We were not as good in the race as in the sprint, but in Baku we took the first step with the car, in Singapore the second, and here another one.
"The Ferraris were incredibly fast, but for us it was all about the fight with Norris. The world title is what we want and we have taken a big step towards that here. Of course Max will want to win more races, but in the end only the title counts," Marko added.
McLaren team boss Andrea Stella, however, blasted the penalty as "inappropriate" - and, fascinatingly, he was backed even more stridently by Mercedes' Toto Wolff.
The Austrian suggests the FIA may be acting in a biased manner in favour of Red Bull.
"In the sprint we saw some of these incidents that were exactly the same and there was no penalty," said the Mercedes team boss. "I see this penalty as just completely strange and bizarre.
"I think we know why, but I can't say it on TV. Just that sometimes there are correlations when it comes to interesting decisions like this."
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Wolff you are a fool.
Wolff it has nothing to do with you.
Continually criticising stewards decisions is unacceptable.
Keep quiet.
Rather listen to his opinion as a professional F1 manager than your biased rants.
Not rants my informed opinion after following F1 for 44 years.
It has nothing to do with Wolff he should shut up. F1 team managers don't always make the most sensible comments. Eg Wolff always making comments about Hamilton as though he walks on water.
I don't take any notice of your comments, mostly nonsense.
They are rants. 'informed opinion gathered from 44 of watching F1 on the tele', well why didn't you say. You should be interviewed rather than current drivers, commentators and managers.
Also, if you don't take notice of my comments how comes you reply?
Because you accused me of rants.
Not just on telly , travelling to different countries to see races in person.
Wolff, Horner , Brown, Vasseur have all said some silly things at times. They are not objective as they should be . Wolff is the one who says some silly things because he is so wrapped in Hamilton , Horner also because he is wrapped in Ricciardo.Lawson performance showed he should have been in the car from the start of the year , it was only Horner keeping Ricciardo in there because of subjective views about Ricciardo.
44 years following F1 I have seen more than Wolff , only been in F1 for what 14 years as team manager and he relied on Nikki Lauda a lot.
Enough said.I was proffering my opinion as I am entitled to do , and to be accused of rants fired me up . But from now on I will ignore your comments.
Both He & Stella couldn't be more right.
Simply unnecessarily inconsistent rule application, especially when comparing the VER-NOR & VER-SAI incidents that happened in a more or less identical manner at T12, with both leaving track limits & the outside driver rejoining ahead, so, as Max didn't get penalized for gaining an advantage via off-track excursion, neither should've Lando or oppositely both equally, if at all.
Likewise, Max had zero intention of making T1 on the opening lap as he clearly started turning leftwards later than he could've at the earliest & unfairly used Lando as a brake, which still wasn't enough to stay within track limits.
The explanation both visually and from experience that AD gave was so simple under the current rules as agreed to by the drivers Max just played the game better, Mcl are just upset they are losing to a better team its simple, you can not agree thats fine but , Max won ,and Lando messed it up all weekend, the pressures building and Lando cant cope
What's the rule about forcing a car off the track then? MV went ALL 4 wheels off the track forcing Lando off when he could've made the corner easily if MV wasn't driving straight.
Ikr. He had zero intention of making T1 as he clearly started turning leftwards later than he could've at the earliest.
FIA should've clamped down such driving nearly three years ago after the Sao Paulo GP T4 incident, but as they didn't, the matter is still ambiguous & inconsistent.
More important for the stewards is the intention, whether Max did or didnt intend to run him wide--cannot be proved, what can be proved is Lando overtook OFF TRACK, Max played the apex rule, Lando broke the no overtake offtrack its that easy, we can all moan and complain, if we dont like the result but those are the rules as of that race day , BUT I am Max and RB fan
The commentator gave a definitive frame-by-frame analysis of why Lando got the penalty. Both drivers were off the track, but only Nando decided to pass while off the track. He clearly accelerated past Max and back onto the track.
Someone made an interesting observation: McLaren knew they'd be assessed a penalty, and rather than give the position back, they decided to race for a 5-second gap.
They gambled, and lost.
So did Max decide to pass Carlos while off track in a similar manner when they went off together at the same corner on the opening lap, & Piastri ultimately also had a similar situation in the sprint, which he referenced as causing ambiguity.
Do opening corners get penalized usually? not arguing just asking the question.!
No, but this particular matter is something where the usual lap 1 leniency argument should be inapplicable.
Agreed. Stella has been in F1 long enough to know that passing off track can attract a time penalty , no good saying they both went off track. He should have been prepared for that possibility and I think they assumed it would only get a 5 second penalty and they tried to get Norris to get more than 5 seconds ahead but he couldn't do it.
The smarter move would have been to immediately tell Norris to give the place back and let him another try to pass in the next 4 laps.
Agreed 1. gained an advantage and 2 . passed a car while off the track, the whiners just cant see it, and the competition are just using smoke/mirrors which is pointless against Rb+Max ,because Max and Rb have been there before , a couple more bad race weekends like this for Lando, and his challenge will be almost over in his head, thankfully only a few days to wait
Lando may not be ready for “prime time”. His emotions seems to always be the problem. He should take a few pointers from his teammate. LN is a go driver, no doubt, but great drivers can check their emotions in the garage.
Wolfe needs to be quiet, he doesn’t have a dog in the fight. Concentrate on MB.
Without that time penalty Norris would have only gained a nett 1 extra point from the weekend.
Norris mistake in the sprint race meant he lost 2 points to Max instead of only 1.Finishing 3rd would have gained 3 points only on Max making it only a nett 1 point gain.
He is not going to win the WDC doing that. He needs to win races to get the 7 point advantage and hope Max finishes back in the field.
Max has won 7 races to Norris only 3 .
Everyone has an opinion, however, in the end the stewards decision is final with no ability for a review or objection to be lodged by anyone! As he was a member of the subject stewards group at cota, I would be interested to hear what Derek Warwick, as driver representative, really thought of the incident.
Reminiscent of the Senna / Prost incident, the Schumacher / Hill incident and the incident earlier this season when Max took Lando out in Austria in a similar move.
Amazes me that Lando was penalised, and Max wasn't at least warned about such driving tactics. Twice now that he has pushed Lando off the track this year. Let's hope Lando learns from this second debacle.
Yeah, McLaren should have been smarter and let Verstappen by to be sure he would not have received a penalty and repass him again. It could then even be that Verstappen would have received a penalty for pushing Norris off the track.
Yes but Lando has enough experience with Mvs racing he should read that, max new Lando would take that approach. Why didn't he ease off & go up the inside. Still a novice.
You got to know when to hold them, know when to fold them,Know when to walk away/Know when to run
was heard to be playing in the Red bull pit area after the race, apparently one of Markos favourite tunes
Didn't know that tune was played, very apt & well chosen.
I may,just may have made that bit up.....😀
He, he.
Shout out to the track itself (and the camera work). Hard pressed to name a better track for an F1 race. Brutally fast and slow sections that test the drivers. The camera seemed to catch the acceleration capability of the cars in a few spots particularly well (e.g. LN’s qualifying lap).
All this + Joss to contend with and Horner still brings his team out on top! Don’t like some of his methods but respect.
Reminds me of Chapman and Enzo.
Yes I think he's earned that as he just brushes it aside & gets on with it which is more than I can say for Toto & Zac brown, I though last year principles were told to shut up & leave it to the FIA, of course all teams want to win, no point in belly aching when you can't match the leaders.. That's why their leaders. Well done Charlie.
quite amusing that ted kravitz of the best broadcaster for f1, no hang on, NOT the best broadcaster of f1 thats it, is even slagging off Stella and Torger now haha , i just love it, more of the same please in Checo land
best of friends now apparently, nice to see Horny and the doc chatting together just after the race with Frau spice supporting hubby and the offspring in close quarters to, Red Bull- a real family affair
For goodness sake F1 racing is F1 racing stop being mamby bloody pamby it's a man's sport with mens cars who risk their lives because they want to do it, get off their backs & let them bloody race. Max is a master, Lando a novice.
Unbelievable that Wolff, Brown ,Stella and some commentators don'f know the rules. Defending car in front at the apex that car has the corner and the attacking car can't pass off the track.
If the attacking car in front at the apex he has the corner, and if the defending car pushes that car off then penalty for pushing that car wide.
Those are the rules.
If they want to change the rules where if both cars go off track each gets a penalty so be it , but Max drove to the rules can't say that's not fair.
I don't always agree with Ted Kravitz but he is completely right.
McLaren thought they could get Norris 5 seconds ahead , it didn't work, the penalty was correct to the rules , end of story.
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