The Mexico City Grand Prix last week had many talking points, but one of the biggest, which was not broadcast on the world feed, happened early on. Following a turn 1 skirmish, Liam Lawson in his Racing Bulls pitted for a front wing change, only to be greeted by two marshals crossing the track under double-waved yellows because parts of Liam’s front wing were on the track.
The footage is frightening and unsettling, given that plenty of procedures are in place to prevent such a thing from happening. What is stranger is that OMADI Mexico, an FIA-sanctioned motorsport body, has gone on record to criticise Liam Lawson for failing to take sufficient action to avoid the marshals. A cynic would cite legal implications as the reason behind the move, but I am baffled by the stance. It is only going to shine a brighter light on the procedural issues and continued complacency around marshals and “VIPs” being put into dangerous situations.
Where was the Virtual Safety Car?
When marshals are out on the track, the virtual safety car (VSC) or safety car proper should be called upon. The VSC is specifically designed and brought in for this purpose, following the death of Jules Bianchi from brain injuries sustained in his accident in the 2014 Japanese Grand Prix. It brings down the racing speed to a more acceptable level, meaning marshals have more time to clear debris and get out of the firing line.
The continued wishy-washy dilution of when or if a VSC is triggered should be solidified. The marshals are volunteers (another problem, I’ll address later) and do an excellent job with the information they are given, but nothing is perfect. For every communication relay point, there is a point of potential failure, and that may be what we saw in Mexico.
Race control communications need access to the right data to make an informed decision
Race control is the single point of communication during a racing session in a Formula 1 event. Whilst I have no idea of the specifics in Mexico, a marshal would never enter a live track without permission from race control first. Race control would relay that message to the relevant marshal post, and only one person per post communicates with race control. Two potential issues crop up here.
Firstly, with 19 of the 20 cars all running together, did race control simply forget that Liam Lawson was in the pits and half a lap behind the rest of the field? If they thought everyone was together, the marshals had 70 seconds to get the debris and flee the scene, rather than the 40-50 seconds. That points to not having clear and easily identifiable access to the data at the right time to make clear decisions. Did the intermittent technical issues that cropped up across the weekend produce a blind spot? Was it an oversight? Who knows.
Secondly, with Mexico being a short lap, the information relayed gets outdated quickly. Liam was with the pack 30 seconds ago, so maybe the signal to go was appropriate at the time, but then not so much as soon as he peeled into the pits. Again, this wouldn’t be a problem if the VSC were triggered as standard for marshals being in danger… which is what it was implemented for. On top of that, miscommunications happen, and maybe something was lost in translation.
Complacency for safety has crept back in
This isn’t an isolated incident, and I fear someone being hurt or killed will end up being the catalyst for change. I’d rather see preventative actions.
In 2023, Esteban Ocon pitted on the last lap of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, only to be greeted by all kinds of people assembling the podium celebration. The group of people were right against the pitlane speed limiter line, so one wrong move or a locked brake would have had disastrous consequences. Photographers seemed to peek out and then jump back like an old school rally stage. It was shambolic. In a similar problem in 2022 at Australia, VIPs were busy taking photos and wandering around the edge of the pitlane when Alex Albon made his last lap stop. Indeed, having VIPs in the pitlane was a trend for some time, but they got in the way and showcased all kinds of safety concerns.
If we dive back to Monaco 2019, we have probably the closest shave we’ve had recently when two marshals straddled either side of Sergio Perez, who was leaving the pitlane mid-race. This was mere inches from an injury, and the luckiest we’ve been to date. This time, a safety car was used to round up the cars to allow marshals time to clear the track. The marshals appeared to start the clean up early, and had been moving debris early when the pack hadn’t been together across the whole weekend, showing a risk-for-the-show approach to get racing underway quicker. However, in Singapore 2016, it was when the safety car entered back into the pits again that a marshal was still on the start/finish straight. He ran to safety at the side of the road, but cars are jinking out to look for turn 1 moves, and a flashing yellow light panel only warns of potential danger, not a request to “prepare to stop”.
The VSC for Sainz was correct
Whilst it was unfortunate timing, Carlos Sainz stopping his car in the stadium and having part of his Williams poking out into the track was still appropriate for a VSC to be thrown. If a marshal has to come out from behind the barriers, they are in the firing line. If F1 refuses to pay them, the least they can do is provide them with a consistent blanket of safety measures. It was right to throw the VSC for this, although it did take a while to resolve. That leads me to…
Formula 1 (and motorsport in general) needs to pay its marshals and have global standards
For a multi-billion-dollar organisation to rely on volunteers and goodwill to run its events is, frankly, one of the biggest shams of motorsport. A step in the right direction is to have a brigade of paid marshals to coordinate newer or volunteer marshals. We see this happening when F1 visits new countries without a strong motorsport heritage. Azerbaijan had (and maybe still has) a lot of UK marshals to support regular individuals who are doing it for a weekend of thrills and spills. The problem is that this inherently adds risk and inconsistency across the globe.
In less mature motorsport countries, the recovery of debris, broken cars, and the repair of broken barriers often takes far longer. Sometimes it’s logistical, such as crane placement, but it is also down to preparation. Local volunteers are a once-and-done affair. In the UK, marshals are required to attend regular training events to keep themselves event-ready, and there are different events and e-learning modules to semi-tailor learning refreshes for each person’s needs. If your city only hosts one big event a year, how are you going to be event-ready? You are learning on the job. By having a dedicated bank of paid marshal leads, the transition to a paid and trained workforce can begin.
It’s a miracle we don’t see these misses happen more often. It is a testament to the organisational design and individual accountability of our volunteer marshals and race control that these things are relatively rare. The complacency is creeping back in, though, and I’d like to see it addressed with firm, actionable measures sooner rather than later.
The FIA is running its own investigation into the Liam Lawson Mexico City Grand Prix incident.
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