Verstappen Responds To Driver Warning From FIA President

Friday, 23 August 2024 at 10:00

Max Verstappen addressed the message from FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem, who asserted that F1 drivers will be punished more severely for criticizing stewards.

Mohammed Ben Sulayem posted an official statement on his Instagram profile during the summer break that warned F1 drivers to avoid criticizing stewards in the future.

The FIA has found a direct correlation between the broadcasted criticism (from drivers) of stewards and the increased number of hateful messages directed towards stewards and FIA officials on social media.

As a result, the president stated that stewards have the power and should punish further incidents of driver criticism more severely. How exactly? That isn't clear yet.

What is clear is that Max Verstappen doesn't really agree with this solution, as he proposed an alternative for the president when speaking to the media ahead of the 2024 Dutch Grand Prix. As reported by De Telegraaf, he said:

"First of all, I would say: then they should not broadcast those on-board radios. Then you have already solved a large part of the problem."

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The triple World Champion is perhaps the one whose messages are broadcasted most often, as he is usually in the middle of the most exciting battle for the win (so he's in center of the attention).

"Then people cannot hear it and simply do not know what is being said there. In every sport something bad will be said about a certain decision, only there they do not have a microphone under their nose."

"Now people hear everything, and they can talk about it on social media. That is where it starts. That's why. This isn't just about officials, but something that plays a role in sports in general, isn't it?"

The interesting thing is that Formula 1 is already censoring some radio messages, and every single message that we hear on broadcast is there because someone confirmed it was okay to be broadcast to millions of people.

F1 is aware that these radio messages add another exciting element to all the battles on the track as we hear the real-time emotions/ reactions of the drivers and their teams. Verstappen added:

"That's why I think it shouldn't just be about the stewards and the FIA. When I read something like that I think: fine, I get it, but it's a problem that many more people have to deal with."