The atmosphere of the 2021 epic world title race reached its climax when two drivers, Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen, came to the last leg of Abu Dhabi with the same score, but the race ended in the most dramatic way in the final moments.
During the safety car in the final moments of the 2021 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, with several snare cars between the leading Hamilton and Verstappen, F1 race director Michael Massy originally issued a notice that "the snare car is not allowed to go beyond the safety car to unwind", but he changed the decision at the last minute, which means that the "barrier" between the two world champions contenders is removed. After the safety car pit race resumed, Verstappen overtook Hamilton on the final lap of the race to win the victory and crown the first F1 world champion of his career.
The way F1 race director Michael Massey handled the safety car incident at the last minute of the race was widely questioned by the outside world.
At the launch of the mercedes' 2022 car W13, Lewis Hamilton clarified to the media that he had no resentment towards Verstappen and that the controversy at Abu Dhabi had nothing to do with him at all.
Hamilton said: "It has nothing to do with Verstappen, he does what any driver would do. He's a great opponent and we're going to continue to fight in the future, just like last year. After so many races, we will learn from them and keep growing, there is no problem between me and him. ”
At the end of the 2021 season, the FIA also launched an investigation into the incident in Abu Dhabi, culminating in the decision to have Michael Massi leave the race director position and take up another role in other divisions, with the future event director position to be rotated by Nils Vitic and Eduardo Freitas.
Born in Portugal, Eduardo Freitas worked early in his career as track Matthew and go-kart race director. From 2002 to 2009, Freitas was Racing Director at Estoril MotorWay, where he was responsible for the FIA-GT World Championship and the European Touring Car Championship (ETCC). From 2010 to 2011, Freitas was the event director of the FIA GT1 World Championships. Since 2012, Eduardo Freitas has been the Event Director of the WEC World Endurance Championship, while he has also served as Event Director for the European Le Mans Series and the Asian Le Mans Series.
Originally from Germany, Nils Viticz has 8 years of experience as a race director, including the German Touring Car Masters (DTM), the European F3 Championship and so on. It is worth mentioning that Vitic served as the tournament director of FE Hong Kong in 2016. In addition, Vitic has been in several F1 races last year to assist Race Director Michael Massey in handling the race.
In addition, the FIA FIA has also carried out a series of reforms before the start of the new season. First, the FIA will set up a "virtual control center," similar to the "video assistant referee" in soccer, the so-called "VAR system," which will assist the tournament director in making more accurate decisions. It is reported that the "virtual control center" will be located in the FIA office outside the track, and remote officials will keep in touch with the event director in the field control center in real time to assist the event director to deal with various situations. Secondly, the fia and team management and the race director will not be presented on television through radio calls, so as to avoid too much external pressure on the race director.
Asked if several of the reforms announced by the FIA this week, including the replacement of race director Michael Massey and the creation of a virtual control centre, would be enough to give him renewed confidence.
Hamilton replied, "Faith and trust have the same place in my heart, and trust will obviously disappear in the blink of an eye or at the snap of a finger." But winning trust takes a long time to build. So, while I didn't foresee this, the content released by the FIA may be the first step in this regard. But that doesn't necessarily change everything. ”
"We have to see real action, and it will take some time. But I'm not really looking at this area at the moment. I just put every bit of my energy and time into showing my best self. ”
For Hamilton, his key is to see the fia fide decision consistent, "While we can't change the past and nothing can really change how I feel at the time, it's nice to see that the FIA is taking steps to improve." I think responsibility is key to making sure something like that doesn't happen to anyone else again. We must pay close attention to ensure that we see these changes and that the rules are applied fairly, accurately and consistently. ”