Lewis Hamilton instructed to speed up during closing stages with questions asked about why Mercedes weren't red-flagged if their cars were deemed unsafe
Thursday 10 September 2015 10:46, UK
A perplexed Toto Wolff has called on F1 to address its processes for measuring tyre pressures after his Mercedes team were cleared of any wrongdoing at the Italian GP.
An incredulous Silver Arrows team were summoned to the Monza stewards after pre-race measurements taken by the FIA on the grid found the tyre pressures on the cars of Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg to be below the recommended limits set by Pirelli.
However, after an interminable investigation that lasted almost three hours, Hamilton's victory was allowed to stand with the stewards determining in a lengthy verdict that 'the tyre warming blankets had been disconnected from their power source, as is a normal procedure, and the tyres were significantly below the maximum permitted tyre blanket temperature at the time of the FIA's measurement on the grid'.
Having greeted their summons with bafflement after the race, the Mercedes chief has demanded a rethink about when precisely tyre pressures are measured before a grand prix.
"You check the tyre pressures in the tyre heaters when you put them on the car," said Wolff. "This is the moment, because you could say 'when is the moment you should check them? Five minutes? Eight minutes from the end, when the red lights go on?'
"I think it is about defining the procedure – and the moment when those pressures are checked – in the future.
"We don't know why we had such a discrepancy. At the end of the day, it can cost performance if you have one tyre that has a different pressure than the others."
New restrictions on tyre pressures were introduced in response to the blowouts which marred the Belgian GP two weeks ago and it's understood that Mercedes were informed that their cars had been found in breach of the new regulations with nearly 20 minutes of the race still to run.
However, both cars were allowed to continue despite apparently running outside of the safety parameters laid down by Pirelli and a perplexed Hamilton was even instructed by his pitwall to speed up during the closing stages.
"In terms of asking Lewis to push when we got the message that there was an investigation into tyre pressures, we didn't understand what was going on," said Wolff. "There could have been possible penalties. And in order to gain a little bit of a margin, we asked him to push."
