The FIA has acknowledged a mistake during Singapore Grand Prix sprint qualifying that affected competitive fairness. After Sergio Perez’s crash triggered a red flag, race control failed to properly reactivate overtake mode, then turned it on for 27 seconds before deactivating it again. This left drivers confused and those eliminated in SQ1 feeling unfairly disadvantaged.
FIA single-seater director Nikolas Tombazis called the incident “the worst thing” for the federation, citing a missed pop-up warning on a race control computer that was not acted on in time due to pressure and workload. He explained that while re-enabling overtake mode is normally a manual safety-checked process, the delay and subsequent erroneous reactivation disrupted the session. Tombazis admitted the situation was “a bit of a mess” and acknowledged it impacted some drivers more than others, interfering with results in a way that undermines the FIA’s core priorities of safety and fairness.
He stressed the need to learn from the error to prevent recurrence. The incident came less than a week after a software glitch disrupted the Bahrain Grand Prix, requiring an emergency update to all cars’ power units before the race could proceed.
Source: Autosport F1 News · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing