Despite securing a P2 finish at the Hungarian Grand Prix, Sebastian Vettel faced the brunt of the stewards after being disqualified.
The FIA disqualified the German after the stewards were able to procure only 0.3 liters of fuel from his Aston Martin AMR21.
Looking at the regulations, a driver has to ensure a minimum of 1 liter of fuel that can be taken from the car at any time during a race.
Once the race ended, Aston Martin requested a right of review alleging that the German’s car had 1.44 liters of fuel.
However, the FIA ruled against the Silverstone-based team on Monday as they were unable to provide any new evidence in favor of the case.
Why was the request for review rejected?
The meeting between Aston Martin’s representatives and the stewards took place on Monday as the outfit claimed that a fuel system failure resulted in there being less fuel in the car.
While the stewards did agree that the information provided by the Silverstone-based team was new evidence, the right to review was still ruled out.
This was because this evidence was not related to the obligation to maintain 1 liter of fuel at the end of the Hungarian Grand Prix.
What did the FIA say?
The FIA released an official statement about the entire situation surrounding Vettel’s disqualification.
“The technical regulations unequivocally call for a remaining amount of 1-litre and does not allow any exceptions,” the statement read.
“Therefore, for the assessment of whether or not 1-litre requirement was broken, it does not make a difference why there was less than 1-litre.
“There may be a couple of explanations why at the end of a race the remaining amount is insufficient.
“In any case, it remains the sole responsibility of the competitor to ensure the car is in conformity with the regulations at all times and it shall be no defense to claim that no performance advantage was obtained.”
What caused Vettel’s car to have less fuel?
The evidence that was presented by Aston Martin took the analysis of over 100 channels of fuel system data.
According to the fresh evidence, there was a fault in the German’s car. This led to a loss of pressure in the fuel cell as it pumped air into it.
This led to a significant amount of fuel being drained.
Aston Martin team boss issues statement
Aston Martin team principal, Otmar Szafnauer, was disappointed by the end result of the entire fiasco.
“We had the feeling that the evidence we presented was relevant and that he (Vettel; editor’s note) should be included in the rating again after his disqualification,” said Otmar Szafnauer.
“Unfortunately, the FIA took a different view. Although the accuracy of our new evidence was not questioned, Sebastian’s disqualification remained as the new evidence was classified as ‘not relevant’.
“This is disappointing and we will now consider how we can deal with the next one Protest proceed,” he concluded.
Do you think the decision taken by the stewards was fair? Let us know in the comments below!
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