Sebastian Vettel and Kevin Magnussen also agree with Tsunoda that the new race directors lack Michael Masi's experience.
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More and more people are speaking out against Formula One’s new race directors. Yuki Tsunoda even expressed faith in the FIA, which the Japanese believe is unreliable when it comes to issuing penalties. Sebastian Vettel and Kevin Magnussen also agree with Tsunoda that the new race directors lack Michael Masi’s experience. It all started after the Monaco Grand Prix where Ferrari’s protest against Red Bull was not given justice because of an error by race director Eduardo Freitas.
A controversy emerged following the Monaco Grand Prix: Ferrari filed a protest against Red Bull Racing suggesting that both drivers had breached the pit lane regulations by crossing the pit lane exit line, but Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez were deemed not to have broken any regulations. The misunderstanding appeared to be the result of a mistake by race director Eduardo Freitas, who duplicated the relevant section of the Event Notes from the previous year’s.
Yuki expressed his dissatisfaction with the FIA. He is afraid that if he even slightly breaches the boundary, he will be penalized. Furthermore, he is upset with the punishment he received for impeding Kevin Magnussen during free practice in Monaco. Tsunoda blames the claimed discrepancy on a shift in race management. He feels Niels Wittich and Eduardo Freitas have a different mindset than Michael Masi, who has greater experience, according to the Japanese.
Read more: Eduardo Freitas appointed as the F1 race director for the Spanish GP
The Aston Martin driver Sebastian Vettel also is also not very impressed with Wittich and Freitas’ work and suggest that at this level of the sport there is a need of someone with much more experience than the current two and the sport would benefit from having a more experienced race director. “What we’re missing now is the experience that Michael [Masi] brought to the track because he’s done it for so long and grew up with it,” said Vettel.
According to Kevin Magnussen he has detected a difference between Masi and the new race directors. This, according to the Dane, has made it more difficult to comprehend and adhere to the regulations. The HAAS driver, too, feels that after Masi’s forced resignation during the tumultuous 2021 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, things have grown less constant, not more.
