Fernando Alonso warns FIA against opening Pandora's box

Alpine

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Alonso warns FIA against opening Pandora's box

Alonso claims up to 70 per cent of cars will be forced to retire with damage in each race

Sam Hall

Thursday 27 October 2022 22:16

Fernando Alonso has warned the FIA "we don't want to open that box" should his penalty from the United States Grand Prix be allowed to stand.

Alpine has appealed a post-race 10-second stop-go penalty, equating to a 30-second time penalty, handed to the two-time champion after Haas protested the legality of his car given he had finished the race with just one mirror, something that directly contravenes the regulations.

Although the protest was lodged 24-minutes after the deadline for such action had passed, the FIA upheld the protest, citing mitigation.

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A scheduled hearing with the FIA in Mexico takes place on Thursday with all teams summoned as Alpine protests the legitimacy of the Haas action in a bid to overturn the penalty, with Alonso adamant the sanction cannot be allowed to stand given the dangerous precedence it would set.

"We protested basically because it was out of time and there were a couple of things that... the FIA was not showing me the black and orange flag, so they thought that the car was safe to keep driving," said Alonso.

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"The car went through parc fermé, passed all of the scrutineering, got a green light from parc fermé and then the protest arrived too late.

"So between it all, I think there is no doubt that this was not the right decision to take and if this is the right decision, it will open a huge problem for the future of Formula 1."

Warning of the consequences of the penalty being upheld, Alonso added: "I think 50, 60, 70 per cent of the cars will have to retire the cars when they have an aerodynamic device that is not properly fixed because the car is going to be unsafe.

"It will open also, if 20 minutes too late is ok to protest, is one month too late? Is one hour too late? Is 10 years too late? That, we cannot afford.

"As I said, this is a very important day for our sport. I don't care about seventh, I am not fighting for the world championship.

"But if this goes ahead, we don't want to open that box."

Alonso claims FIA made "very clear" mistakes

Alonso is optimistic that the FIA will side with Alpine and reinstate his seventh-place result from the Circuit of the Americas.

Explaining the reasoning for this, Alonso continued: "The FIA has been very transparent with us this year.

"I think the new leadership, also with Mohammed Ben Sulayem, are doing things a little bit different than in the past. So I have full trust in what they will decide.

"I think there are a couple of things that are very clear that were wrong from their side.

"So, as I said, I am very confident that I will be P7 again in Austin. If I am not P7 at the end, I am sure they will explain why and we will see it clearly, so I am very relaxed about that."