AUGUST 15, 2024

FIA clear up sporting regulations confusion

The FIA has published two sets of Sporting Regulations in the last day of July, the first still to be applied during the rest of the season, while the 2025 Sporting Regulations received a much bigger overhaul as it was necessary to include all the provisions for the teams to test with mule cars at Pirelli’s requirement, something Aston Martin will be the first team to do when Stoffel Vandoorne will be the first driver to fell what the 2026 cars will be like, during a two-days test in Monza.

The first mission the FIA had was to fill an important gap in the Sporting Regulations, regarding penalties applied during Sprint events and that were exposed during this year’s Chinese Grand Prix.

Close to the end of the Sprint race in Shanghai, Fernando Alonso was struggling with tyre degradation and was trying to avoid dropping too much down the order. Having just been passed by fellow Spaniard Carlos Sainz in a forceful move, the Aston Martin driver immediately tried to regain the position, but collided with the Ferrari driver, being forced to retire with damage a few laps later.

Having been considered mostly responsible for the accident, Fernando Alonso received a five-second penalty, but as the veteran had already retired, he was never able to serve it. Now the FIA has amended the regulations concerning penalties awarded during sprint races. Article 54.3.d now explains that a penalty received during a Sprint can be carried over to the following race (the main race of that Grand Prix) if it could not be served during the Sprint race.

Also during the Chinese Grand Prix, but in qualifying, Sainz was involved in another incident that caused a bit of controversy. The Ferrari driver spun coming out of the last corner during qualifying, hitting the inside wall on the main straight and was stationary for quite a while, the Race Director bringing the red flag out. Sainz, however, managed to get back on track, making it to Q3, to qualify in P7, leading Aston Martin to protest, the British team believing that the regulations had not been applied correctly.

Now the FIA has also amended that part of the regulations, making it clear that, “any driver whose car stops on the track in an area other than the pit lane during the qualifying session or the Sprint qualifying session and who receives physical assistance will not be allowed to get back on track.” There’s no mention of being responsible for a interruption of a session, so there’s now no doubt that what Sainz and Ferrari did in Shanghai was entirely within the regulations.

Finally, the FIA added Article 10.10 to the regulations, governing testing with mules, modified cars in order to best prepare for the 2026 regulation change. Teams will be able to use cars from the last four seasons during these testing sessions, which should also allow Pirelli to best prepare its tires for the new regulations. However, the Italian manufacturer has already warned that it seems more than difficult to create these mules, particularly due to the reduction in the width of the single-seaters, from 2m to 1.80m.