REVEALED: Why Stewards Dismissed Aston Martin’s Request for a Review of Vettel’s Disqualification

Sebastian Vettel was disqualified from the Hungarian Grand Prix after securing a P2 finish at Hungaroring. The FIA ruled out the German after the stewards could only get 0.3 liters of fuel from his Aston Martin AMR21. And according to the rules, drivers must ensure one liter of fuel, at a minimum, to be taken from their car at any time during the event.

Soon after the race ended, the Silverstone-based team requested a right of review and claimed that the German’s car had 1.44 liters of fuel. However, on Monday evening, FIA ruled out Aston Martin’s appeal for Sebastian Vettel’s disqualification at Budapest, as the team failed to provide any fresh pieces of evidence.

Watch Story: When F1 Drivers Had a Blast on Top Gear Featuring Hamilton, Vettel & Ricciardo.

Why was Aston Martin’s request for a review rejected by the stewards?

During the Aston Martin and stewards’ meeting on Monday, the Silverstone-based team claimed that failure to ensure the 1.0 liter in the Aston Martin AMR21 was because of the fuel system failure.

However, the stewards believed the information provided by Aston Martin was significant new evidence, but ruled out the right of review of the Silverstone-based team, as the evidence was not related to the obligation to provide 1 liter of fuel at the end of the Hungarian GP.

The FIA statement reads: “The technical regulations unequivocally call for a remaining amount of 1-litre and does not allow any exceptions. Therefore, for the assessment of whether or not 1-litre requirement was broken, it does not make a difference why there was less than 1-litre. There may be a couple of explanations why at the end of a race the remaining amount is insufficient.

“In any case, it remains the sole responsibility of the competitor to ensure the car is in conformity with the regulations at all times and it shall be no defence to claim that no performance advantage was obtained.”

What caused the problem in Sebastian Vettel’s car at Hungaroring?

According to Motorsport-Total, the evidence provided by Aston Martin demonstrates the analysis of over 100 channels of fuel system data. The fresh evidence states that there was a fault in the fuel system in Sebastian Vettel’s car. And because of the loss of pressure in the fuel cell, it pumped air into it. As a result, a significant volume of fuel was accidentally drained.

Meanwhile, the Aston Martin team principal, Otmar Szafnauer, was disappointed by the steward’s verdict.

“We had the feeling that the evidence we presented was relevant and that he (Vettel; editor’s note) should be included in the rating again after his disqualification,” said Otmar Szafnauer. “Unfortunately, the FIA ​​took a different view. Although the accuracy of our new evidence was not questioned, Sebastian’s disqualification remained as the new evidence was classified as ‘not relevant’. This is disappointing and we will now consider how we can deal with the next one Protest proceed.” 

(Quotes translated via Google)

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