Reject of the Race - Belgium 2021 (POLL UP)

[Londoner]

1. Race Control/FIA. Four hours of utter chaos, miscommunication, and a rulebook seemingly being rewritten on the fly. Liberty Media will get involved after this debacle in some way, mark my words.

2. Michael Masi. Time for him to go.

[Klon]

1. Race Control/FIA. Four hours of utter chaos, miscommunication, and a rulebook seemingly being rewritten on the fly. Liberty Media will get involved after this debacle in some way, mark my words.

2. Michael Masi. Time for him to go.

I will agree with this, but only at 2. and 3. because the first place goes to Pirelli. This wouldn't have happened if we had wet tyres that weren't complete trash.

Edit: Christian Horner gets the dishonorable mention of a lifetime. WHY THE BATHPLUG ARE YOU THANKING MASI FOR THIS; WHAT KIND OF METH ARE YOU ON!?!?!?!?!

[Nessafox]

1. Race Control/FIA. Four hours of utter chaos, miscommunication, and a rulebook seemingly being rewritten on the fly. Liberty Media will get involved after this debacle in some way, mark my words.

2. Michael Masi. Time for him to go.

I can honestly not have a different opinion than to second this, but dishonourable mentions for Sergio Perez and Pirelli rain tyres as well.

[ElBerto]

I won't throw Michael under the bus here. It is a team effort.

FIA / FOM / Liberty for ROTR. bathplug them all.

[Fetzie]

1. FIA falling for the sunk-cost-fallacy

2. Cars unable to be driven in rain (aero making bad visibility and tyres unable to disperse water fast enough)

DHM 1: us lot for sitting through that (see 1.)
DHM 2: Perez for crashing on the out lap

[went]

1- The 2021 Rolex Belgium Grand Prix

2- Pérez, for binning a handful of totally free points

[Barbazza]

What londoner said - a perfect summary.

[dr-baker]

Whoever dropped this bombshell: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lU4Hy_B5Joo

[Miguel98]

1. The whole afternoon - Cars that can't race, massive confusion regarding rules, misscomunication and a massive sunk-cost fallacy. I hope the fans get their money back.

2. Sergio Pérez - Well

[Meatwad]

So many possible nominations without a race... I could give it to race control for all the randomness (who knew the clock could be stopped?), the rain for ruining everything, Pérez for throwing away points... I'll just nominate the race itself.

[Alextrax52]

Can’t argue with what Londoner said really. Bigger farce than USA 05 purely because even that race had some cars racing.

Go home FIA, FOM and Michael Masi and think about what you’ve done.

Also

Sergio Perez for crashing and losing Red Bull what turned out to be an extra 3 points.

[Francophone]

Been a while since I was last here - been busy with life , work , etc ..

Guess it's the rain cloud which kept dumping water onto the circuit , never clearing up enough so we could actually have the cars racing safely . Checo also binning it under the recce lap also is pretty rejectful too.

Let's see what the organizers do about refunds , but if they don't do what Lewis suggested then their nomination trumps everything above.

[rachel1990]

1. Race Control/FIA. Four hours of utter chaos, miscommunication, and a rulebook seemingly being rewritten on the fly. Liberty Media will get involved after this debacle in some way, mark my words.

2. Michael Masi. Time for him to go.

Agree with every word above

[Londoner]

If this is the case, then I think the entire race has ROTR under lock and key.

[Enforcer]

I'm not any of the following:

1) An FIA steward at any level.
2) A race engineer.
3) A Pirelli engineer.
4) A racing driver at any level.

So I'm going to assume that not running the race was correct, and it's not due to easily avoidable flaws or deficiencies with the tires (visibility seems to have been at least as big an issue), or the drivers not being brave enough to risk their lives for our entertainment, or incompetence by from Masi and is just a force majeure job.

However, I'm still nominating the FIA & Race Stewards for the farcical couple of SC laps they ran late on largely just to generate a result. If it's not safe for the race to go ahead, then it can't go ahead. No result. Nil points. What they did there is give points for qualifying (and not crashing on your way to the grid).

[James1978]

Myself for thinking at the start of the programme "Oh great, rain, that should make it exciting"!

[Francophone]

Seeing as there's no main thread I want to say that I'm not sure I fully agree with the shade being thrown at the stewards and Michael Masi.

Yes , they should probably have not strung everyone along as much as they did and have given more useful updates ("no action for next 30 mins , will re-evaluate at 1700 etc).

I think they also should have stopped the race clock sooner (so we have 2 hours of racing remaining - and also meaning that once it was obvious weather would not improve the race to be called off sooner)

They could have also had running more laps under the SC (at least 5-10) under the first attempt to try and get a dry line and possibly disperse some of the water from the track .

But asides from that I'm not sure what else they could have done with the mess of a rulebook they had , and given some . There needs to be a rewrite of several regulations though with all the confusion and mess going on , and scope for more flexibility to run races on Saturdays/Mondays if something like this is likely.

Like what happened at the Nurburgring last year constant rain and low cloud/mist really screwed and unlike then it was on Sunday as opposed to Friday so we lost the race as opposed to practice.

Also , the worst of the spray was through Eau Rouge/Radillon which has seen three of the most horrific accidents I've ever seen in the last three years , not counting Lando's yesterday.

A 1998-style pileup would also be very interesting in a cost-cap environment , I'd reckon Rosset would have needed deep pockets to pay for all the wreckage he caused slamming into it a full speed

[Aislabie]

1. Michael Masi - Not just for anything he did on Sunday, but for continuing qualifying after four drivers had either complained of aquaplaning or demonstrated it, and only throwing the red flag once a driver had had the inevitable crash - at the same point where six drivers had slid off the track in matching conditions in the previous day's support race.

2. The three-hour time limit rule - Not only a stupid rule that leaves no leeway whatsoever for a delayed start, but also what kind of limit can be arbitrarily paused for convenience.

Dishonourable mentions include:

• Sergio Perez, for binning it on the formation lap
• The weather for being a dick
• The ruleset that gave us cars that cannot handle rain
• Nikita Mazepin for losing his fastest lap
• My friend and I for sitting through four hours of that when we had the entirety of Sky (his subscription) to choose from
• Gary Anderson for pointing to Brazil 2003 as an example of good race direction

[Miguel98]

I'm changing my nomination to this and only this:

[Rob Dylan]

There's so many hats in this ring, why not throw yours in too Stefano...

F1 CEO Domenicali resists calls for refunds as Hamilton brands Belgian GP a “farce”

If what happened today doesn't constitute a refund for people who went to the circuit, no F1 fan will ever get a refund for anything ever. In fact, as someone looking to go to Silverstone next year, I'm now thinking of not going simply out of principle.

[mario]

There's so many hats in this ring, why not throw yours in too Stefano...

F1 CEO Domenicali resists calls for refunds as Hamilton brands Belgian GP a “farce”

If what happened today doesn't constitute a refund for people who went to the circuit, no F1 fan will ever get a refund for anything ever. In fact, as someone looking to go to Silverstone next year, I'm now thinking of not going simply out of principle.

Under the terms of sale, the circuit has explicitly stated that "No refunds or exchanges are available in respect of tickets unless the Event is cancelled." https://www.spagrandprix.com/en/customer-notice

Now, I would not be surprised if the magnitude of the public backlash guarantees that there will have to be some sort of recompense - but, as it is, because a race officially took place, those fans who were there are not entitled to a refund.

I do agree with the points made above that the FIA did kind of find itself backed into a corner, not least because of the reaction to the W Series crashes and with Norris's accident in qualifying, and the low hanging spray was causing a lot of problems with visibility for the marshals, not just the drivers - it seems the marshal posts were complaining that the visibility was so poor that a car could have broken down between marshal posts and the marshals wouldn't have been able to see that there was a stationary car on track.

I do feel, though, that there really should have been more of an effort by race control to explain the situation - whilst the fans might still have been frustrated and angry, the anger might not have been so great if the fans felt they were at least being kept properly informed about what was happening, rather than the confused mess that they were being presented with.

Now, the cynicism of the response by Domenicali has really aggravated what was, for many, an event already seen as surpassing the Indianapolis 2005 debacle in terms of being tone deaf towards the fans - at least Indy 2005, farcical as it was, actually did have some cars take to the track and run a full race.

It's especially the case that many feel that Domenicali is effectively leaving the circuit to be hung out to dry, as they'll probably be the one that has to take the hit on any refunds - there's no sign that Liberty Media are prepared to forgo their fee for the race.

[Wallio]

F1 as a whole - The big thing everyone said about Indy 2005 was that "there could have been SOMETHING they could have done". Well that applies doubles here. Indy 2005 at least had cars racing (and the Ferraris nearly took each other out). SOMETHING could have been done. This is a bathplugging joke. Absolutely embarrassing.

[RAK]

1) Sergio Perez: While I think the FIA and race control's debacle is more risible, Perez's before-the-race crash is more conventionally rejectful and cost Red Bull a handful of points which might have come in quite handy.

2) Race control, FIA, Michael Masi and Formula One in general: Well done on your race-that-wasn't-a-race. Could this have been the most significant Saturday qualifying ever?

[MyHamsterRacedAnOnyx]

Here's a suggestion- there is a TBC in the calendar slot kicking around in November sometime.
Why not
a) Eliminate this weekend completely and reallocate Spa that TBC spot
b) Tickets from this weekend automatically gain admission to that new weekend?

[dr-baker]

Here's a suggestion- there is a TBC in the calendar slot kicking around in November sometime.
Why not
a) Eliminate this weekend completely and reallocate Spa that TBC spot
b) Tickets from this weekend automatically gain admission to that new weekend?

What's the weather like in Spa Francorchamps that time of year?

[MyHamsterRacedAnOnyx]

Probably as changeable as in the middle of August

[Nessafox]

Here's a suggestion- there is a TBC in the calendar slot kicking around in November sometime.
Why not
a) Eliminate this weekend completely and reallocate Spa that TBC spot
b) Tickets from this weekend automatically gain admission to that new weekend?

What's the weather like in Spa Francorchamps that time of year?

Racing in november in Belgium is absolutely not recommended. It's usually pretty rainy and cold, can even freeze sometimes. But the main problem will be that it will get dark really early.

[UncreativeUsername37]

1. The rules - Did the race start? Is the four, sorry, three-hour limit going? Wait, you can pause the three-hour limit? Why do we need the whole rule anyway when we're now keeping sunset in mind with the race start times? Also, wasn't there this one WEC race where there were a few laps under safety car and half points were awarded and people were like "okay, really", so they changed their minimum laps to minimum green flag laps? Why didn't all FIA series follow? Why should delaying the start take a lap off? Why doesn't Mazepin get to keep his fastest lap when the top 10 get to have points?
2. Pérez - Crashed before the race got going, then the whole thing was under safety car. Sounds rejectful to me

[Francis23]

1. FIA, slam dunk, should have either found a way to run the race tomorrow or cancel it with no points and refund the fans
2. Perez, yes the conditions were difficult but throwing away easy points like that won't win Red Bull the Constructors'

I'm going to go easy on Masi, he had a difficult job and remember he probably had a lot of corporate pressure from above

[RAK]

Here's a suggestion- there is a TBC in the calendar slot kicking around in November sometime.
Why not
a) Eliminate this weekend completely and reallocate Spa that TBC spot
b) Tickets from this weekend automatically gain admission to that new weekend?

I think that one's more of an implicit TBA in Qatar. And Liberty Media aren't going to give up the chance for those Qatari petroriyals any time soon...

[Pacific Edge]

TBH, I think the FIA/FOM were in a no-win situation, had they cancelled the race, they would have been hit by not only refunds, but also people criticizing them for not having a minimum race so Russell could get a podium.

So.... My nomination goes to Perez, even Mazepin managed to make it to the grid.

[Vassago]

1. FIA - for allowing to outbid the 2005 US GP fiasco, This one takes the cake for worst F1 Grand Prix ever. They should have cancelled it if they deemed the rain was too much. Instead we got a one lap Grand Prix with half-points. Pathetic all around.

2. Michael Masi - this was his Brian Barnhart Loudon 2011 moment. He's NOT the man for the job. Just get rid of him.

[Wallio]

If this is the case, then I think the entire race has ROTR under lock and key.

A few journalists have asked this question, and according to the FIA, the "points after 2-laps" rule and the red flag countback rules are separate, as such, one does not overrule the other. The "race" did run 3 laps, so it is official. The CLASSIFICATIONS are what they pull from countback. Which could have gotten VERY spicy if someone had slid off on that last lap.

[Bleu]

We had kind of situation with percentages in Brazil 2003.

The original information said that race was stopped when 54 laps were completed, therefore countback took the results from lap 53. This was less than 75% out of scheduled 71 but full points were still awarded from the beginning. Obviously when it was later corrected that there was 55 laps completed, pushing countback to lap 54 this was no longer the case as 75% of the distance was in the official classification too.

[Rob Dylan]

The poll is up at the top of this thread

Three of these options are directly related to one another, but all had their own separate part to play in making this one of the most rejectful races in F1 history. Pick your candidate, you have 24 hours