Haas has lodged a protest against Alpine and Red Bull regarding the lack of black and orange flag due to damage in F1 US GP.
The 2022 F1 season has seen multiple black and orange flags for Haas’ Kevin Magnussen for damage to his front wing. The Dane has been forced to pit and change it thereby losing places, which has certainly irked the American outfit.
The F1 US GP saw lots of incidents where front wing damage was high on the list. Red Bull’s Sergio Perez had his endplate gone in the opening laps after a touch with Alfa Romeo’s Valtteri Bottas, but the Mexican was never shown a flag to change it.
As for Alpine’s Fernando Alonso, he lost his mirror late in the grand prix after his tangle with Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll. Before the mirror detached itself, the cameras showed it to be flapping on the straights but even in this case, he wasn’t shown a flag.
The couple of incidents has pushed on Haas to lodge a complaint with the FIA, with a hope of an investigation and clear answers into the situation. Should the stewards agree to the arguments, they will eventually summon and investigate the incidents.
Here’s the FIA note of protest:
Reason: To assess the admissibility of two protests concerning the following matters:
Protest 1 – Against Car 14 / BWT Alpine F1 Team – Technical infringement
Protest 2 – Against Car 11 / Oracle Red Bull Racing – Technical infringement
Note: Should one or both of the protests be deemed admissible, separate hearing(s) will be convened at which all relevant parties shall be heard. Such hearing(s) will commence at 18:15
UPDATE: Following the protest into the matter, the FIA has agreed to listen to the case from Haas and has summoned the representatives of both Alpine (Protest 1) and Red Bull (Protest 2) at 18:15 and 18:45 local time – respectively – to understand if the matter needs further investigation.
UPDATE 2: Following the separate discussions and debate into the matter, the FIA dismissed the protest against Red Bull and Perez but upheld against Alpine and Alonso. As the result of which, the latter was handed a 10s stop and go penalty.
This dropped him outside of points which dropped him to 15th, as Vettel was seventh, Magnussen eighth, Tsunoda ninth, Ocon 10th, Guanyu 11th, Albon 12th, Gasly 13th and Schumacher 14th ahead of the Spaniard.
The hearing saw Haas being represented by Gunther Steiner, Ayao Komatsu and Peter Crolla during the Red Bull’s case. Crolla did not feature at the time of Alpine, while the FIA had Nikolas Tombazis, Jo Bauer and Niels Wittich for both. Alpine only had Alan Permane while Red Bull had Jonathan Wheatley and Paul Monaghan.
The arguement from Haas were same in both the cases regarding similar instances on their side, but in Red Bull’s case, Bauer noted that the endplate had fallen off and it was not deemed unsafe which cleared them of any issues and the protest dismissed.
But in Alpine’s case, the FIA team agreed with Haas regarding the lack of black and orange flag shown to Alonso where they agree that the flapping mirror was dangerous and the car being unsafe which is why the penalty was handed.
Here’s the full report on Red Bull side: https://www.fia.com/sites/default/files/decision-document/2022%20United%20States%20Grand%20Prix%20-%20Decision%20-%20Haas%20Protest%20-%20Car%2011.pdf
Here’s the full report on Alpine: https://www.fia.com/sites/default/files/decision-document/2022%20United%20States%20Grand%20Prix%20-%20Decision%20-%20Haas%20Protest%20-%20Car%2014.pdf
Here’s how F1 US GP panned out
