“Disgusted” Gian Carlo Minardi gives verdict on Melbourne procedures and Carlos Sainz penalty. Minardi on Melbourne procedures and Carlos penalty.

As usual after each Grand Prix, Italian manager Gian Carlo Minardi, the eponymous Formula One team founder, commented on the events of the race in Australia through his official website. The former F1 team manager focused above all on the controversial decisions taken by the race stewards during the race.

Here are some of his most important comments:

Gian Carlo Minardi’s view
“I’m disgusted,” Gian Carlo Minardi headlines his analysis of the 2023 Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix. “At any cost they want to make Formula 1 spectacular, but Melbourne really hit rock bottom,” he says.

He then added: “From the yellow flag, we passed to the first (of the three) red flags following the Albon accident, quickly passing through the virtual-safety-car and safety-car. The apex was reached two laps from the end after Magnussen’s Haas went off the track when race director Wittich had the red flag displayed again opting for a new restart, from which the third red flag came out due to the contact between the two Alpines that eliminated themselves”.

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What happened in Melbourne had probably never been seen in the history of Formula 1. “Truly it was all too much”, underlines Gian Carlo Minardi, who then pointed out that “there continue to be unclear rules and completely different interpretations between a grand prix and the other. It’s time to say enough and clarify. The race director is not without mistakes, in my opinion distorting the order of arrival for a grand prix that has worldwide significance. The most damaged, in this situation, are certainly the two Alpine drivers” – he continued.

And according to Gian Carlo Minardi, Scuderia Ferrari too should have appealed against the 5 seconds handed to Sainz, a decision which the Maranello team eventually made after almost one week: “The Spaniard made a mistake in contact with Fernando Alonso, but the penalty makes no sense because the new ranking was not taken into account in the following restart” .

“Every decision is justified under the wording “safety” but today, with these choices, the drivers are in even more danger. The SC and VSC could easily be used, as it always the case, without inventing all these little moments. The same race stewards groped in the blind giving personal interpretations. The race direction was the real protagonist of this grand prix, stealing the show from the drivers. We need clear rules with non-subjective decisions”, he commented before ending his analysis talking about the performance of various teams.