FIA Forces Teams to Slow Down F1 Pit Stops — Should It?
The FIA has sent out a new technical directive instructing Formula 1 teams to slow down their pit stops. Citing safety concerns, the FIA will require mechanics to take more time during the pit phase starting at the Hungarian Grand Prix later this year. Will this actually improve safety, or has Mercedes once again successfully leveraged the FIA to hurt Red Bull Racing, its championship rival?
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New F1 pit stop rules explained
The new technical directive imposes restrictions on the equipment used during F1 pit stops. “Devices which are used to fit or remove wheel fasteners may only be powered by compressed air or nitrogen. Any sensor systems may only act passively,” part of the directive reads.
Additionally, mechanics must have reactions above a minimum time. If a mechanic reacts to the completion of a pit stop stage in under 0.15 seconds, a sensor must register the reaction as invalid and require the mechanic to repeat their action. Then, after the car is lowered back onto the ground with its new tires, there must be a minimum of 0.2 seconds before the driver receives the green light to go.
In other words, F1 pit stops will be at least 0.35 seconds longer for the teams that are currently managing to do everything at the same time. According to the FIA, the purpose of the new directive is to ensure that wheel nuts are fully tightened onto the cars during stops and to ensure mechanics are actually reacting to the different stages of the pit stop process rather than anticipating them.
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How the teams have reacted
The new pit stop rules are expected to hurt Red Bull Racing more than any other F1 team. In recent years, the Milton Keynes-based outfit has routinely set the standard for fast pit stops. It holds the record for the fastest-ever F1 pit stop at 1.82 seconds (set at the 2019 Brazilian Grand Prix, which you can view below) and has the six fastest pit stops so far in 2021, half of them under the two-second mark.
Red Bull Motorsport advisor Dr. Helmut Marko was not pleased. He says the FIA created the new directive in response to complaints by Mercedes, Red Bull’s main title rival, whose pit stops this season have been, on average, about half a second slower. “Mercedes pushed it because they wanted to steal our advantage during pit stops,” Marko said. “We lose up to four tenths. Seven years of work and training have gone into the consistency and speed of our pit stops.”
Notably, some teams have raised suspicions that Red Bull may be using automated devices to achieve its record-low pit stop times — and the new rule that sensor systems “may only act passively” shows the FIA has been taking that possibility seriously. McLaren and Alpine, which are among the worst-performing teams in this area, have expressed support for slower F1 pit stops.
The fan reaction to the new directive has been overwhelmingly negative. It is, at best, viewed as yet another attempt by the FIA to fix something that isn’t broken. But largely, fans are irritated that Mercedes, which is finally facing genuine competition after dominating the sport for seven years, seems to be getting help from the FIA.
Will slower pit stops actually improve safety?
Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner had a lot to say about the directive, claiming that it could actually reduce safety rather than the other way around. “To have to hold the car for two tenths of a second you could almost argue it’s dangerous because you’re judging your gaps, the guy that’s releasing the car is having to make that judgment and I think that it’s not been well thought through,” he argued, not altogether convincingly.
It should be said that in the past, some cars have been let go by their pit crew before every wheel was fully attached. A loose wheel on the track is a very dangerous thing, not only because it usually causes an immediate crash for the driver who loses that wheel, but also because it may strike another car, a marshal, or even a spectator. At the 2001 Australian Grand Prix, trackside marshal Graham Beveridge was killed by a flying wheel that came off Jacques Villeneuve’s car.
Loose wheels haven’t been a problem in F1 so far this year, but an incident occurred at last month’s Indy 500 after Graham Rahal’s pit crew seemed to do exactly what the FIA wants to prevent: it incorrectly anticipated a wheel being attached and let the driver go. Rahal’s tire subsequently came loose and while he crashed, the tire bounced around and struck another car. Fortunately, nobody was injured, but the outcome could easily have been worse.
One could thus argue that forcing mechanics to take more time to ensure that tires are secured is exactly the kind of regulation that may seem pointless now but could be obvious in hindsight. If the FIA does nothing now and an improperly fitted tire leads to somebody’s death in the future, the FIA would come under fire — as it has been in the past — for taking action after tragedies rather than before them.
Compromising innovation and competition
Horner was understandably miffed by the new directive, given its impact on the racing team he oversees. “Formula 1’s about innovation and competition and seeing pit stops sub-two seconds is a remarkable feat. We should be encouraging it, not trying to control it, otherwise where does it stop? We’re going to be told which way to walk into the garage, where we should sit on the pitwall and which buttons we should press, I guess,” he fumed.
But he also argued that pit stops are an important competitive and entertaining aspect of the sport. “It’s been an exciting element [of F1],” he told SkySportsF1. “Can a group of people change a wheel in less than two seconds? We’ve demonstrated that with the world records that we’ve achieved. But you’re going to dilute that and take that away now and control pit stops to make them pretty much the same time. It takes away the competitive element of it.”
Thanks to advances in safety in other areas, loose wheels have not led to anyone’s death in F1 since that 2001 incident, which had been caused by a crash and not a rushed pit stop. In this context, it seems Horner may have the right of it: the new directive could be unnecessarily removing one of the sport’s most competitive elements.
Kurt Verlin was born in France and lives in the United States. Throughout his life he was always told French was the language of romance, but it was English he fell in love with. He likes cats, music, cars, 30 Rock, Formula 1, and pretending to be a race car driver in simulators; but most of all, he just likes to write about it all. See more articles by Kurt.