Drivers to wear biometric glove in 2018

The governing body of Formula One, the FIA, has announced that drivers are set to wear gloves which feature a 3mm sensor which will provide 'lifesaving data' to medical staff in the unfortunate event of a crash on the circuit during a race.

The FIA has made safety one of their main targets for improvement recently, and it was announced last year that this glove was in development.

"We asked ourselves how we could use state of the art technology to help our medical team and therefore the drivers," the FIA's Laurent Mekies told Sport Bild.

"The drivers are very supportive of this move to improve safety."

The introduction of the new safety device will not be mandatory until 2019, but drivers will have the opportunity to wear it starting from the 2018 campaign, and Mekies has revealed some of the knowledge which medical staff will receive in the event of an accident on the track.

"If you know whether the driver is moving and breathing, you can make quite different decisions," he continued.

"For instance, does the car have to be moved quickly to access the driver, or can the recovery be done more cautiously?"

Another safety measure which has recently been introduced by the FIA is the 'halo device' which has polarised the opinions of fans and figures within the sport. The device comes in the form of a frame which surrounds the head of the driver to block any potential falling debris, but critics have lamented the decreased vision for the driver behind the wheel as well as its allegedly unpleasing aesthetic look.