Given the poor reliability suffered by teams in testing there has been a lot of speculation about how many cars might finish in Australia this weekend, with incidents potentially adding to the attrition rate.
When asked today FIA race director Charlie Whiting said that he will stop the race if there are no cars running.
“First of all I’d like to say that I think a lot of these Doomsday scenarios are quite unlikely, knowing F1 teams and how efficient they actually are,” he said. “But if it came to the situation where no cars were running we’d just simply stop the race, because there wouldn’t be much of one, would there? But being serious I think that would be the only option. If the race couldn’t be restarted, as the rules say, then the results would be declared at the lap prior to the one during which the race was stopped, and whoever was running at that time would be the winner.”
In theory races can last until the two-hour mark, but Whiting said the clock would not be allowed to run down until the flag was thrown on the off chance that someone might fix their car and re-emerge.
“I don’t think we would [wait]. If it became clear that there wasn’t a race any more, because there were no cars on the track, I think we would stop the race, because there wouldn’t be much else to do, really. It’s not something that’s foreseen by the rules, and obviously it’s something that we hope doesn’t happen.”
Whiting agreed that if attrition is high cars that might normally have retired could re-appear after repairs.
“I’m not sure we should really be talking about this, I stress I think it’s highly unlikely, knowing the professionalism of the teams! But once they started dropping like flies I think the ones that thought they’d stopped – because they don’t have to officially retire of course, they can come back out again – they might think hang on minute, I might get something here, let’s get this old girl going again and get back out there…”
They would of course have to complete 90% of the winner’s distance in order to be classified and score points.
Adam Cooper F1 
“But once they started dropping like flies I think the ones that thought they’d stopped – because they don’t have to officially retire of course, they can come back out again – they might think hang on minute, I might get something here, let’s get this old girl going again and get back out there…”
Actually, that’s something I’d like to see.
And having the TV crews fill the time between the last dead car and the checkered flag at 2 hours would be entertaining.
I gotta admit, I don’t mind red flag periods in races. That’s because the TV folks have a bunch of filler pieces queued up for just such an eventuality which we don’t normally get to see. I hate for them to go to waste.
I don’t think I knew you had to finish 90% of the winner’s distance in order to be able to score points. Has there ever been a race where no points were awarded for 6th place, for example?
I think Charlie realised he was digging a hole as he spoke and that he was creating a theoretical situation that could be manipulated with some strategic, non-genuine retirements, where a team preserved the car & put it back on track a little later to get a recorded finish. I suspect there will be more said from him later to tighten this up.
Reblogged this on bobespirit2112 and commented:
Surely, some cars will go the distance, but you never know. This year is definitely the largest degree of power-train delta in F1 (all of racing?) history. I’d say it’s a real possibility (~20-30%) that it could happen. I doubt a single car has run a complete race distance simulation in testing, so you it’s conceivable issues will emerge over the last two-thirds of the race distance for even the more reliable units. Based on testing, I believe you’d have to think most, if not all the Renault runners will be out by mid-distance. It’s definitely going to be exciting to see what happens. So, the question; is Charley correct that the teams are so capable that it isn’t a likely scenario?