Following the US GP, Toto Wolff and Lewis Hamilton have consistently been in the headlines, following their reactions to Hamilton DSQ. While Charles Leclerc was also a victim of the post-race plank check, Hamilton faced a bigger loss, given his battle for P2 in the driver’s championship. After losing out on important points in Austin, Wolff is ready to gamble with the regulations once again. However, F1 commentator and expert Martin Brundle calls the Austrian out for his “flippant” remarks.
Ahead of the Mexico City GP, Wolff and Co. are aiming to continue their aggressive approach rather than opt for a conservative setup following Hamilton’s DSQ in Austin. The 51-year-old admitted to his team being up for a gamble on the regulations to vie for a race win in Mexico. However, a report from Crash.Net quotes Brundle as being entirely against the move.
“I think Toto is being a bit flippant there. Toto and Lewis have done a very good job this weekend of saying ‘nothing to see here, look at all these others, they must have been cheating as well’ – cheating is too strong a word, found to be outside of the regulations.”
Fellow pundit and former F1 world champion Jenson Button agreed with the words of Brundle during a coverage show from Sky F1. He claimed it was a “flippant” remark and no team would want to get caught for cheating . Given that Mercedes received the ultimate penalty only last weekend, the potential move by Wolff might not be the best decision.
Amid bias accusations from Lewis Hamilton, Brundle explained why the FIA chose those specific cars
As the Austin GP came to an end, the race stewards called four cars (driven by Verstappen, Hamilton, Norris, and Leclerc) in for the plank measurements. As only half of those cars were able to pass the test, it called for speculation over the legality of the unchecked cars. Hamilton even blamed the authorities for not being fair by not checking all the cars on the grid. He added that he heard from several sources that many more cars were illegal on the grid after the race.
Such a shame for Lewis Hamilton at the #USGP 💔 pic.twitter.com/JYosZqWqXz
— BBC Sport (@BBCSport) October 23, 2023
However, Brundle explained the reason behind the selective check as he said the stewards did so because of the data they saw on their screens. Peter Windsor seconded Brundle’s stance on the incident as he added random spot-checking has been a long-standing tradition in the sport. However, he added the authorities needed to increase the number of spot checks to improve equality within the sport.
