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The FIA will not make any alterations to the weighbridge rules in Formula 1 in response to Sebastian Vettel's incident last weekend. Vettel damaged the scales as he pulled off from them on his own accord, rather than waiting to be pushed away.
The German admitted that he was frustrated as he hadn't yet set a lap in Q2, and pitted for the soft tyres. The FIA called him in on a random screening, with Vettel wanting to get in and out as soon as possible.
The four-time world champion was investigated by stewards post-qualifying and was handed a reprimand and a €25,000 fine. Daniel Ricciardo defended Vettel, saying it was unfair to call a driver in when he hadn't yet set a time in changing conditions.
"I think all it’s done is reminded the teams that if they choose to do something like that then they run a risk, said race director Charlie Whiting. "Two risks, really, in this case. The first one obviously was the time they spend doing a lap which is a little unpredictable. If you add another minute to that for the potential of being weighed then you need to factor that into your decision.
"What annoyed Sebastian obviously was being stopped. Ferrari did something slightly unusual. They went out one on type of tyre to explore the track as it were, came in, and there’s a risk. There will always a risk that you’re going to be stopped. They know that and they should factor that in. This is what I’m always telling the teams.
"It should be something that they say ‘if we do this, how is this is how long it will take, we might get stopped so we have to add a minute’. It’s something they should always factor in. And I think it’s completely random. It’s a system that we program to say ‘we’re going to stop the first car, second car, third car, so we don’t know which cars coming in.
"I think Jo [Bauer, FIA technical delegate] seldom tries to stop the first car that comes in because in a short qualifying session like that the first car could be a car coming in with a mechanical problem having just done a half a lap. But to see two cars come in for strategic reasons after one lap is unusual. It’s just the way it goes.”
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G. Zhou
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boudy
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Again this makes sense, although drivers might not agree with it. Changing this procedure might bring more issues than it solves. Vettel acted dangerously on the weigh bridge and could have hurt someone.