Russell won't thank Ben Sulayem for 'suspect' changes to 'ludicrous' measures

18:23, 15 May

Updated: 19:18, 15 May

byNorberto Mujica

Recently the FIA, at President Ben Sulayem's request, the penalty meausres in the Sporting guidelines were changed dramatically, but it all means very little to GPDA co-director George Russell.

Despite the recent changes that involve fines being cut to half, and the acknowledgement of mitigating circumstances, Russell sees little to no positive aspects with regards to the back-tracking on the controversial measures put forth by the FIA at the beginning of the year.

'Ludicrous rules should never have ben enforced in the first place'

"Well, I feel the changes should have never happened in the first place. So we're talking about a situation where things have been reverted, because it was a little bit ludicrous in the first place."

"Of course we're happy to see things go back to how they should be, but it should never have been there in the first place if that makes sense. So it feels a bit wrong to be thanking the changes when we shouldn't have been in that place to begin with," stressed Russell.

Russell suggests lack of effort to establish communication from 'suspect FIA'

Do these changes imply any sort of communications between the FIA and the F1 drivers in the background? Russell reveals no such communications have taken place, and labels the change 'suspect'.

"It's a bit of a strange predicament. We've still had no correspondence with anyone from senior level FIA. So yeah, it's all a bit suspect."

"It seems more challenging than it should be really [for drivers to discuss matters with the FIA], but we've all put our views forward. But I wouldn't say it's gotten to a point of no return, but you at least want to see willingness from the other party."

"I think we feel we've put our views forward and we want to have conversations and dialogue. There's only so much you can ask. So yeah, it's got to be mutual and it's got to come from both directions."