Baku 2016

[The Black Knight]

The 5 minutes penalty on Kimi was harsh and unnecessary. There was clearly no gain in time crossing the line like he did. A warning would have sufficed, l thought.

The radio debarcle was just ugly. It shows the rule on radio was not well thought through. Coaching is one thing, asking technical question about a complex system is another. I hope common sense prevail when this is next discussed with the FIA. In the circumstances faced by Hamilton and Raikonnen, the rule just seemed like something out of Alice in wonderland.

I think it's just another example of the repeating systematic knee jerk reactions that the powers at be do in F1. F1 is like a wild river with people being swept away with ideas and notions, knee jerk reactions to every issue instead of actually taking a step out and looking what can be done to fix the problem. This has been ongoing in F1 for many years but has really come to the foreground in recent times with the extra information at our finger tips due to .social media outlets.

Unfortunately, until such time as Bernie croaks it or steps down, I don't see it changing as he, in my opinion, is a big part of the problem. He's an old dinosaur. He's great for the likes of CVC to get the best business deals but when it comes to the core health of F1 he's an absolute disaster. It's his fault that the teams have so much power in F1 because of the concorde agreement he signed with them. The whole thing is a shambles at the moment and, until such time as he goes, I don't see much things really changing. The power he has given RBR over the last few years and how he has bent to their whim is ridiculous. RBR wanted the rules changed in 2014 after 4 races because they were no longer winning and Bernie just went along with them. We wouldn't have these rule changes for 2017 if it wasn't for Bernie being their little puppet. And now, just when the performance is beginning to merge after two years they will change the rules again and probably move back to a situation similar to 2014 with one team dominant, except maybe this time it will be RBR, McLaren, Ferrari or Mercedes and the rest playing catch up. For real competition the rules need to be stable.

Regards the driver coaching, it probably had gone too far with drivers being told where to lift off in corners, or what gears to take etc over the radio, but now it's gone too far the opposite direction. Yesterday had a negative impact on the show where a driver that could have made the race exciting, wasn't able. The teams needs to be allowed to tell the driver if there's an incorrect setting and what to do to fix it or at the very least answer the drivers questions. Fine tuning needed.