No I don't think I can; he drove at that speed so that he could kept a big enough gap to HAM to enable him to make a stacked pit stop without loosing a place. So it seems entirely 'necessary' in the context of the motor race, and more to the point surely, not at all unsafe.
The reason why we never see it happening is because the rules say you get a penalty for it (except of course if you drive the Mercedes, do as you like then). Clear and simple. Sorry to break it to you.
Jeez if Mercedes gets to break all those rules I wonder why anyone else shows up. The sour grapes are way past their sell by one this forum. Boring. Stupid. And so predictable.
The rules state the drivers must be a certain distance from the safety car, and then each other, and are not to unnecessarily impede other drivers to gain advantage. It was mentioned in the commentary, but as is clear, the only people to have been penalised for breaking these rules in the last few years have been other drivers, no Mercedes drivers despite their being highlighted as breaking the rule. Facts, not assumptions and wishful thinking are to be employed by the stewards, supposedly, but a blind eye is always turned to Mercedes
The thing is, that in this particular case, the cars hadn't yet formed up behind the safety car. So none of that applies. Sorry.
Yep. Another clear case was last year at the German GP. The future of this race was in doubt and some of us all predicted, after Lewis was cleared again of blatant cheating, that in the coming few days it would emerge that the German GP would return and also be funded by Mercedes. But no. Apparently we're all "seeing things"
They are supposed to maintain station and not intentionally hold others up. Don’t split hairs, rules are rules. If it was okay, why did the commentators, who know the rules far better than you, state that Bottas might be penalised for his actions
I don't think you are in any position to judge how well anyone knows the rules. Strangely enough there was no penalty, so I guess I know better than the commentators in this case.
There will always be people unhappy with the stewards décisions, or lack of, but most of the dissatisfaction seems to come from a partisan group, and not from the participants themselves. It's amusing to see people resurrecting cases that have been close for years just to make a point when in fact the interested parties seem to have forgotten all about them.
To answer your question I guess teams are penalised for driver error and vice versa. The driver is part of the team! Exactly, the FIA rules 27.4 state quite clearly At no time may a car be driven unnecessarily slowly, erratically or in a manner which could be deemed potentially dangerous to other drivers or any other person. or in a manner is quite important. However, regulation 39.4 states under SC No car may be driven unnecessarily slowly, erratically or in a manner which could be deemed potentially dangerous to other drivers or any other person at any time whilst the safety car is deployed. This will apply whether any such car is being driven on the track, the pit entry or the pit lane. Regulation 39.7 states All competing cars must reduce speed and form up in line behind the safety car no more than ten car lengths apart. In order to ensure that drivers reduce speed sufficiently, from the time at which all teams have been sent the “SAFETY CAR DEPLOYED” message via the official messaging system until the time that each car crosses the first safety car line for the second time, drivers must stay above the minimum time set by the FIA ECU at least once in each marshalling sector and at both the first and second safety car lines (a marshalling sector is defined as the section of track between each of the FIA light panels). The important bit is did Bottas stay within the lap time delta set on the FIA ECU, my guess his he did with Mercedes carefully calculating in real time how much to slow down. Clever but possibly not in the spirit of the rules and certainly not within 10 car lengths. Tony
