Publications
Partners
Hockenheim, Germany - Red flags will replace waved double yellows in the event of hazardous incidents in qualifying, F1's race director Charlie Whiting said on Friday (July 29).
Whiting made this newly-revised position clear following last weekend's controversy surrounding Nico Rosberg's pole lap at the 2016 Hungarian Grand Prix.
Drivers will have to stop
The German drove through a waved double yellow zone and only slowed by one-tenth of a second.
The decision means that all drivers on track at the time of an incident that led to a red flag would have to stop.
"That's what I intend to do in the future, just to remove any discussion about whether a driver slowed down or not," Whiting told reporters at the German Grand Prix.
"I think most drivers decided to call it a day and stop their attempt at qualifying," he added, referring to the incident at the Hungaroring earlier in July.
"But in Nico's defence, he had only one yellow sector to go through, and that was a short one - whereas the other drivers had two yellow sectors to go through.
"So there is a difference. I just don't want to get into these discussions where you need to try and decide whether a driver has slowed down enough.
"If you apply the double waved yellow flag rule absolutely to the letter it says you must be prepared to stop."
Stewards at the Hungarian Grand Prix sent the wrong message by failing to penalise Rosberg, his Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton had claimed.