Former F1 star Juan Pablo Montoya believes that the crew member who attempted to remove Lando Norris’ grid marker tape ahead of the United States Grand Prix needs to be ‘suspended’ by the FIA for a handful of races.
Norris uses marker tape on the track-facing side of the pit wall to ensure that he hits his marks when pulling into his grid slots. The consequences for failing this are severe, and the Brit was even hit with a five-second time penalty in Bahrain after starting too far forward in his stall.
Ahead of the race in Austin, a Red Bull employee reportedly reached over the pit wall in an attempt to remove the marker tape. In the FIA stewards’ report, it was noted that the crew member “did not appear to react to their efforts to prevent him from entering the gate well area.”
In the meeting with the stewards, the Red Bull representative argued that the employee did not hear the instructions from the pit marshals.
“It is justified,” Montoya told Joe Fortune. “But the other thing, in my opinion, they should do, as they do in NASCAR, which works really well, is suspend the crew person. Whoever did that should be suspended for a couple of races.
“At the end of the day, if that guy is a tyre changer, it means it’s going to hurt Red Bull when they do the stops. If somebody wants to interfere like that, it should get suspended by the FIA for a race or two.
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“A fine is nothing, £43,000 is nothing when budgets are in the hundreds of millions. But the stir it creates is worth it for Red Bull. Absolutely worth it. It’s about them, again, getting into the heads of McLaren. It is like, ‘We are here to f*** with you, and we are going to do whatever we can to ruin your day.’”
Explaining the importance of grid markers to F1 drivers, the six-time Grand Prix winner said: “As a driver, especially nowadays with the big cars, when you come to the grid, you basically always look for references to make sure you maximise your position in the box.
“When you get close, you don’t see the line, you don’t see anything. You might use the side, the mirror, and a mark to make sure you’re in the right place.” He added: “When you get to the box, you look to the side, and you see the mark, and you know you’re in the right place. It prevents you from messing up.”
