Did FIA 'Oil burn' directive slow any F1 cars in Baku?

[John S]

Was Ferrari 'hammystrung' by Merc crying aux oil tank foul? 

Motorsport.com seems unsure Maranello suffered noticeably from FIA directive, but a gap may become more perceptible in Austria. Here's what Jon Noble thinks..........   

Oil burn controversy

As teams arrived in Azerbaijan, word leaked out of a fresh technical directive issued by the FIA regarding the season-long talking point of burning oil as fuel.

Amid suspicions that the FIA had found – or been alerted to – something that a team was doing, F1’s technical department reminded teams that it would deem any attempt to use ‘additional components or substances in oil for the purpose of enhancing combustion’ a breach of the rules.

Such moves from the FIA never come without good reason, and the F1 rumour mill ramped up that it had been prompted by Mercedes querying areas where it suspected Ferrari may have been doing some clever tricks involving its auxiliary oil tank.

Was this the revenge on Ferrari having got suspension systems that Mercedes and Red Bull were planning on running this year banned on the eve of the campaign?

Mercedes was keeping tight lipped on the matter, and Ferrari strongly denied that it had been doing anything illegal or needed to change anything in light of the latest FIA stance.

But conspiracy theorists had a field day that, on the same weekend the FIA TD was issued, Ferrari was further off Mercedes that it had been all season...

In reality, Baku’s gap though owed more to tyres and confidence than engine power though (especially considering Vettel had to revert to a well-used power unit), so it may not be until Austria that we will find out if anything has changed in that Q3 phase when engine power is ramped up to the max.

Courtesy Jonathan Noble, Formula 1 Editor, Motorsport.com, Today.


 

[Andy B]

Something I read awhile back was that the teams rarely put in a complaint they just ask questions of the FIA and its going on by them all all the time and the only one's we hear about are the one the press get wind of.
As we know the press never let the truth get in the way of a good story.