Red Bull boss Horner points to FIA after Verstappen and Russell incident

15:25, 02 Jun

Updated: 17:38, 02 Jun

byLudo van Denderen

Red Bull Racing Team Principal Christian Horner believes that the race direction, and thereby the FIA, should handle an incident like the one between Max Verstappen and George Russell in Spain differently in the future. The Brit also makes a call to action.

In the final stages of the Grand Prix, Russell and Verstappen were battling, with the Brit initially overtaking the reigning champion. Verstappen, however, took a detour and rejoined ahead of the Mercedes driver. This led Red Bull to decide that Verstappen had to give the position back, to the great dissatisfaction of the Dutchman.

A mistaken decision by Red Bull

Red Bull was indeed worried that Verstappen would receive a time penalty if he didn't concede the advantage to Russell. Only afterwards was it revealed that the stewards would not have penalized Verstappen had he stayed ahead of Russell. In hindsight, it was therefore a mistaken instruction from Red Bull to Verstappen, Horner also admits, before also calling on the FIA.

"I think that's where it would be nice as the referee, as a race director, to either say play on or you need to give it back. I think it's very hard for the team subjectively to try and make that call because you're going on hysterical precedence," Horner said after the Grand Prix, among others to GPblog.

"You're looking at what you have in front of you and you're trying to preempt what the Stewards and the race director is thinking. So I think it would be. I think it would be beneficial to the teams in that instance, for the race director to make that call. And so you either give it back or you get a or you get a penalty, rather than having to try and second guess what the Stewards are going to do."

No help from the FIA

Red Bull could have asked the race director for help. "But you get nothing back. That's just policy. I don't know. It seems.It seems to be. It seems to be. I used to get some guidance, but now it's very subjective for the team to make that because it was debatable whether he's ahead of the apex or not."

"We looked at all the slow mos and it was really 50. 50. And is George under control of the car? Would he made the corner? It looked like he would have made the corner. So you make the call to say, 'look, we need to give this place up.'"