The FIA enters the era of VAR and prohibits radio communications

Ben Sulayem has been President of the FIA for only a few weeks, and he has just made significant decisions following the controversy surrounding the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix 2021, where the judgments of Michael Masi, the race director at the time, may have been difficult to understand.

In addition to dismissing Michael Masi from his role, who will be replaced by 2 alternating race directors and an assistant, Ben Sulayem announces 3 other measures.

An assistance control room

Just like the VAR (Video Assistance Referee) in football, the FIA will now have a video-assisted control room in order to make the best decisions.

This room, located in the premises of the FIA and not on the race tracks, will be connected live to the race director to assist in enforcing the regulations as they were designed.

It is important to note that the sporting or technical regulations of the FIA concerning Formula 1 change regularly and contain thousands of different rules. Up until now, Michael Masi was supposed to be the sole interpreter. Therefore, the race director will have these prompters, like in the theater, and will likely be more consistent in his decisions.

To assist the race director in his decision-making process, a virtual control panel will be created. Just like the VAR in football, it will assist the race director on the circuit. In direct connection with him, it will allow him to provide the necessary information to apply the sporting regulations to the letter.

The FIA Teams’ radio communications will be prohibited.

For the show in 2021, the radio communications between the team managers and the race director were broadcasted on TV. However, these radio communications have been in existence for a long time.

In order to no longer be influenced and focus on the enforcement of the regulations, team managers will no longer be able to communicate directly with the race director during the race.

« Direct communications during the race, which are broadcasted on TV, will be removed, in order to protect the race director from any pressure and to make decisions calmly. It will still be possible to ask questions but with a new non-intrusive and well-determined process. » explains Ben Sulayem.

The doubling of cars under the safety car is going to be reviewed.

In the last 3 laps of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, only 3 lapped cars were ordered to unlap themselves to get back on the same lap as the lead drivers. This means that the other lapped cars behind Max Verstappen did not receive this request.

The FIA regulations state that “the” cars must lap each other, without specifying whether it refers to some or all of the cars that are behind.

Left to the discretion of a single person, this rule is too vague to avoid the controversy that followed and allowed Max Verstappen to end up behind Hamilton with fresh tires in the last 2 laps.

This rule will therefore be reviewed shortly in order to clarify it.