Seidl: It is necessary to eliminate all gray areas in the regulation

After finishing the Japanese Grand Prix, it was not immediately clear that Max Verstappen won the championship, and even the Red Bull Racing team felt that one point was not enough for this, as the distance of the race was shortened and everyone was sure that less would be awarded at the end of the points.

This year, however, the rules have been modified to include a clause that allows full points to be awarded if the race was stopped by red flags and then restarted.

Andreas Seidl, team principal at McLaren, believes that all teams have a responsibility to ensure these gray areas exist in current sporting regulations.

“As far as I understand, when changing the regulations it was not the intention to award the full number of points in situations like the one in Suzuka,” Seidl told Motorsport Week. – And since there is such a clause, the points may be awarded in full even if we do two laps (after the restart), after which the race ends.

There was clearly no such intention. Ultimately, this is bad because it turns out we’ve overlooked all that. That is why I am prepared to agree to this, even if it does not suit us now. So we just need to clarify the wording.

I feel personally responsible for that, because in the end we adjust the regulations every year in the low season and every team has the opportunity to clarify ambiguities.

Together with our team we have not yet done a detailed analysis, but as far as we understand all the points of the rules that, after last year’s race in Spa, have been formulated together with the FIA ​​​​and Formula 1. only applicable if the race did not have a normal finish.

If this is true, we’ve all made a mistake, that’s for sure. This means that we are all responsible, and in the winter off-season we have to try to sort everything out and get rid of all the gray areas in the regulations that are still there.