Carlos Sainz – Sergio Perez and when to return the position: what the rules say. What the rules say about giving the position back.

Scuderia Ferrari Spanish driver Carlos Sainz has slated the “unnecessary mess” he was put in with Red Bull’s Sergio Perez due to the fact that the FIA did not take action so that Carlos could get the position back under safety car conditions Jeddah Corniche Circuit. The Mexican driver pitted on an unfortunate moment for him, just one lap before the safety car was deployed in the 2022 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix after Nicholas Latifi crashed. This was a great opportunity for Scuderia Ferrari to get ahead of Sergio Perez, as Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz went in for fresh tyres.

“I think as a sport, we need to keep analysing these things because we could have simplified things so much more if Checo had just given me the position [back] during the safety car which would have given me the opportunity to fight Max at the restart and would have given Checo an opportunity to fight me and get the position. What happened is, I was obviously fighting Checo but I know Checo was going to give me the position quickly and he couldn’t fight me because he was going to give me the position back. In the end, we created a mess that, for me, was unnecessary given the fact we did six laps behind the safety car and there were millions of opportunities for Checo to let me by and have a good fight at the restart.” – the Ferrari driver explained.

Red Bull may have used the regulation as the perfect shield to protect Max Verstappen’s second position by returning the position to Carlos Sainz in a ‘textbook’ manner. During the Safety Car regime, in fact, there is no change of position behind the safety car except obviously for the permission to the drivers to unlap themselves, which is given through clear instructions by the Safety Car and the Race Direction (one other possible scenario is when one car proceeds slowly to the point of being dangerous, in this case it is possible to overtake the car). The reason why positions are not exchanged under the Safety Car is obviously related to safety by avoiding any misunderstandings and potentially dangerous situations for the marshals working on the track. Obviously, this literal interpretation of the regulation was convenient for Red Bull yesterday and therefore Sergio Perez moved after the first chicane, thus giving way to Carlos Sainz only when Max Verstappen was already far from the Ferrari F1-75 and launched in pursuit of Charles Leclerc.