Formula One’s biggest-ever attendance for a Grand Prix weekend ended with the fans booing from the stands and streaming away from the circuit before the cars had completed their cooldown laps. Why? Because of the decision of Race Control to allow what had been an exciting afternoon of racing to finish behind the safety car.
The exact reason for this was a lack of quick thinking by the FIA officials in waving by the lapped cars. Since the Abu Dhabi debacle of 2021, where Race Director Michael Masi engineered a racing finish to the event and the drivers’ championship, the rules surrounding the retraction of the safety car have been rewritten.
The Silverstone Cost of a One-Second Delay
Now, once the instruction has been issued for the lapped drivers to be waved around, there must be one complete lap before the safety car is withdrawn. At Silverstone, Race Control issued this instruction around one second too late, given the first of the lapped cars, Oscar Piastri, had just crossed the start/finish line.
That one second was not safety-critical, given the stricken Red Bull of Max Verstappen was clear before the safety car arrived at Stowe corner, several seconds before the completion of the lap. It’s just that nobody was taking notice of this regulation and ensuring the instruction to the lapped cars was issued on time.
The problem Formula One has is that it sticks rigidly to its ‘sporting principles,’ which hark back to times when the FIA kept time with officials sitting on benches at the start/finish line with stopwatches. Keeping track of lapped cars was not an easy matter, and so the integrity of racing principles was key to getting the right race classification at the end of the Grand Prix.
The Safety Car’s Chaotic Origins
The safety car made its first unofficial appearance at the torrential 1973 Canadian Grand Prix at Mosport. Officials deployed a yellow Porsche 914 to neutralize the race after a heavy crash.
However, there were virtually no established rules or communication procedures. The safety car driver mistakenly pulled out in front of the wrong car (Howden Ganley) instead of the actual race leader (Emerson Fittipaldi or Peter Revson, depending on who you asked). This allowed several drivers to gain a free lap on the rest of the grid. Because laps were still timed by hand, it took timing officials several hours after the chequered flag to figure out who had actually won the race. The experiment was deemed a total failure and largely abandoned for two decades.
When F1 reintroduced the safety car in 1993, the ghost of the failed experiment twenty years earlier had been long forgotten, and following a safety car period when the track again went green, the lapped cars remained in the order they had been collected by the safety car.
Yet back in those days, safety cars were rare. F1 might go an entire season without seeing one deployed. It was come the turn of the millennium when the rise of the safety car began, but even then there might be several races before one was deployed by the Race Director.
The Evolution of the Un-lapping Rule
In 2007, the FIA decided that lapped cars were interfering with the restart of the Grand Prix, and so introduced the wave-by, where prior to the restart they would be allowed to overtake the snake and return to the rear of the field.
For 2010 and 2011, the lapped car rule was abandoned, given the tedious nature of waiting to restart the Grand Prix while those irrelevant to the result of the race trundled around a lap—often delaying the restart for two to three laps.
Due to a couple of races being ruined by backmarkers interfering after a safety car restart, the rule was reintroduced for the 2012 season. And it remains today, although tweaked following the 2021 last-lap shootout in Abu Dhabi.
The Flaws of Modern Timing Arguments
Why the lapped cars do not merely fall to the rear of the field, saving a huge amount of time, is a question nobody attempts to address. In other major international motorsport racing series, this is the methodology adopted. After all, waiting for lapped cars to unlap themselves at places like Le Mans would simply be farcical.
So, it is fundamentally unfair that lapped cars gain the advantage of unlapping themselves despite having been so slow in the race they deserve to be one lap down. Secondly, computerised timing now deals with this issue, so there’s no confusion for the timekeepers.
A More Sensible Solution
Given that the FIA is safety-mad and we have safety cars almost every race weekend, what would be a more sensible solution to restarting a Grand Prix more efficiently? It’s simple: allow the lapped cars to filter to the back as they do in IndyCar, or, so long as the start/finish straight is not blocked by the incident causing the safety car, make them filter through the pit lane.
How American Racing Protects the Fans
In IndyCar, should a safety car be required during the final ten laps of a race, the red flag is immediately thrown. This protects the integrity of a racing finish. If a minor incident like a spin occurs which would normally bring out a full-course yellow and consume several laps, the Race Director will invoke an “Abandonment of Procedures.” Under this rule, officials leave the pit lane closed, skip the time-consuming process of sorting out lapped traffic, and immediately bunch the field up to throw a green flag with one or two laps remaining.
At the 2026 British Grand Prix, there were no lapped cars interfering with the top five behind the safety car and so the podium positon finishes were protected from interference.
Should an incident occur in Idycar with just two laps remaining, then the race will finish under the safety car—which very rarely happens. These red flag procedures have prevented the ‘greatest spectacle in racing’ from finishing behind a safety car at Indianapolis in 2014, 2019, 2022, 2023, and 2026.
It’s time the FIA woke up from its slumber and instigated procedures to speed up the withdrawal of the safety car to ensure a proper racing finish that the fans deserve. A one-second delay was a lapse of concentration from Race Control at Silverstone, and certainly not a safety matter, and it robbed the fans of a thrilling one-lap shootout to the finish.
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A.J. Hunt is Senior Editor at TJ13, where Andrew oversees editorial standards and contributes to the site’s Formula 1 coverage. A career journalist with experience in both print and digital sports media, Andrew trained in investigative journalism and has written for a range of European sports outlets.
At TJ13, Andrew plays a central role in shaping the site’s output, working across breaking news, analysis, and long-form features. Andrew’s responsibilities include fact-checking, refining editorial structure, and ensuring consistency in reporting across a fast-moving news cycle.
Andrew’s work focuses particularly on the intersection of Formula 1 politics, regulation, and team strategy. Andrew closely follows developments involving the FIA, team leadership, and driver market dynamics, helping to provide context behind the sport’s biggest stories.
With experience covering multiple seasons of Formula 1’s modern hybrid era, Andrew has developed a detailed understanding of how regulatory changes and competitive shifts influence the grid. Andrew’s editorial approach prioritises clarity and context, aiming to help readers navigate complex developments within the sport.
In addition to editorial duties, Andrew is particularly interested in how media narratives shape fan perception of Formula 1, and how reporting can balance speed with accuracy in an increasingly digital news environment.
