McLaren thinks that Formula 1’s aborted-start procedures could be tidied up in the wake of the confusion over Lando Norris’s rules breach at the Brazilian Grand Prix.
With Lance Stroll having beached himself in the gravel at Turn 4 following a formation-lap off, F1’s race director decided to abort the start when the cars had formed up on the grid.
In theory, that meant the start was abandoned and the drivers should have waited on the grid for a scheduled restart.
However, pole position man Norris and fellow front row starter George Russell took it as a signal to complete another formation lap – with several cars behind him also following him away.
Other competitors were aware of the rule that they were not supposed to move off, but they were quickly given permission to also go because of the problems that would have been caused by some cars doing extra laps.
After the race, Norris and Russell were both handed a reprimand and fined 5000 euro each for not following the expected procedures.
However, McLaren team principal Andrea Stella thinks that there is some ambiguity in the wording of the rules – especially with the way things played out in Brazil, with the decision to abort the start only being made once the cars had formed up on the grid.
“When you look at the letter of the regulations, it’s a little tricky, because in the extra formation lap, there is talk about delayed [starts], then there is the aborted [start] and it talks about returning to the grid,” he said.
“So there are some technicalities that may have made the situation a little confusing for Lando. I guess he just reacted to the lights at the time.”
Stella’s mention of the regulations refers to the two different ways that starts will be called off.
Article 46.1 references a "delayed start", which occurs when the formation lap has not started and the cars are still on the grid.
Then there is an "aborted start", which happens when the formation lap has started. It references that "all cars should return to the grid and all competitors will be informed of the likely delay using the official messaging system."
In Brazil, Norris and a majority of other cars were already on the grid when the aborted start message came through.
Stella thinks that it might make sense to clear up the expected procedures to ensure that everyone understands better what to do in repeat scenarios in the future.
“Overall, we think this is a very benign situation,” he said. “If anything, it should give the opportunity to clarify a little bit what to do in these cases because the call came very late, when Lando had been sitting on pole position for a long time.
“If there was an aborted start, I think the conditions were present for a long time to give it. So this confused the driver a bit.”
