The first day of track action in Shanghai had perhaps more surprises than expected, not only due to the arrival of rain but also because of two similar incidents that occurred both during the first free practice session and during the Sprint Qualifying.
In both sessions, the grass on the inside of turn seven suddenly caught fire, requiring marshals to intervene with fire extinguishers. In FP1, it was necessary to display the red flag, while in qualifying, fortunately, the incident occurred at the end of SQ1, with minimal impact, except for a slight delay in the start of the second session.
The FIA is still searching for a definitive answer to the causes of these incidents, especially considering that it has rained heavily in recent days. Even before the start of Friday’s qualifying, a few raindrops fell, wetting the grass.
After the first incident, the FIA visited the area before qualifying to try to understand exactly what had caused the fire. The most credible explanation is that, due to a slight bump in that area of the track, sparks caused by the cars scraping against the asphalt ended up on the grass, starting the fire.
However, this is only a partial explanation, as no one expected to encounter such significant problems, especially considering that the ground was still damp from the recent rain, with the track completely wet on Wednesday afternoon.
Various theories have emerged about what might have exacerbated the effect, such as a chemical reaction generated by gas seeping from the subsoil or, more likely, that the grass had been treated with some chemical agent to enhance its appearance. It’s important to remember that, except for some local competitions, the track has been largely unused for years, which led the GP organizers to carry out maintenance works, like those done on the asphalt, where a layer of bitumen was poured but not completely reasphalted.
However, the FIA’s initial inspections on Friday did not shed much light on the situation. Given that it was not an isolated incident, having also occurred during qualifying, the governing body wants to get to the bottom of the matter and find the real cause. Indeed, there is a concern that it could happen again during the sprint race or the main race: in that case, it would be necessary to neutralize the race either with the entry of the Safety Car or even with the red flag, clearly influencing the progress of the Grand Prix.
The problem of fires had never been encountered in Shanghai before, even though this is the first year Formula 1 visits China with the new generation of ground effect cars, which produce a lot of sparks as they need to stay close to the asphalt to generate aerodynamic load.
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