Haas F1 protests seeking consistency from FIA stewards

The protests were prompted by Kevin Magnussen receiving three black and orange flags for endplate damage over the course of this season, despite the team explaining to the FIA that thanks to its design a flapping endplate would not detach from the car.

In Austin, Perez received front wing damage on the first lap, which led to the endplate flying off shortly afterwards.

Meanwhile, after Fernando Alonso survived contact with Lance Stroll and a brush with the wall, his right-side mirror was seen flapping for many laps.

Haas contacted race control about it, but no action was taken, and the mirror eventually flew off. Alonso continued and eventually finished seventh on the road.

Haas protested both cars on the basis that they were running in an unsafe condition. The Perez protest was dismissed because the FIA decreed that having lost the endplate, the wing was safe.

However, the Alonso protest was upheld, with the FIA acknowledging that the car shouldn’t have been allowed to run either with the mirror flapping and a potential danger to other cars, or afterwards with it absent and Alonso’s rearward vision compromised.

Alonso was penalised 30 seconds, which promoted Magnussen from ninth to eighth place.

“I’m not targeting anybody,” Steiner told Motorsport.com. “I mean, for me, it needs to be consistent. The FIA is the regulator and they need to get consistent.

“If there is a mirror missing and the rule says you need to have two mirrors, why can you say we had an accident, there’s only one? You still need to have two.

“Sometimes it’s okay, sometimes it’s not OK. We need to find a way to make it okay or not, that you know what you’re doing, and that is what we tried to find out, if it is consistent or not.

“At least we work on the future. To drive without a mirror, in our opinion, in the rules it says you have to have two mirrors, it’s pretty simple. I mean, there was one mirror, how he lost it I don’t really care.

“We saw it flapping, and then they should get a black and orange, and then it flew off. And then he should be disqualified because he has no safety equipment. It’s the same as if your headrest comes up, you need to go out.”

Regarding the Perez wing, Steiner highlighted an apparent anomaly in that if an endplate is retained, it can lead to a black an orange flag, but if it flies off soon after contact, the driver escapes penalty.

“On the front wing, it’s…