MontreaL: World champion Max Verstappen yesterday said a mid-season intervention on safety grounds to solve Formula One’s ‘porpoising’ problems was “a bit of a shame.”
The Red Bull driver led the way as drivers and teams reaction to the idea of a potential rule-change was widely, but not entirely, rejected.
The sport’s ruling body, the International Motoring Federation (FIA), on Thursday announced it was intervening with a series of steps on medical grounds to prevent or eliminate ‘porpoising’ and excessive bouncing after several drivers complained bitterly after recent races.
“I think it’s a bit disappointing that again there is a rule change mid-season, I would say,” said the 24-year-old Dutchman. “It’s not about affecting us more or less than other teams, but it shouldn’t be that one team is complaining a lot and suddenly then they change the ‘regs’ around it. I think there are a lot of teams that actually did an amazing job to not have these kind of issues, so it is possible to drive around it.”
His reference to one team suggested he was talking about rivals Mercedes who have struggled badly with their new generation ‘ground effect’ car this year. “If you raise your car then you won’t have these issues, but you lose performance,” he added.
Seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton and his Mercedes team-mate George Russell, together with others including Pierre Gasly of Alpha Tauri, Valtteri Bottas of Alfa Romeo and Daniel Ricciardo of McLaren warned of potential long-term physical consequences after acute back pain.