FIA president risks Toto Wolff wrath with defence of Red Bull ‘punishment’

FIA president Mohammed ben Sulayem has risked angering Toto Wolff and Lewis Hamilton after defending Red Bull. The FIA chief claimed bosses would not intervene with rule changes despite Max Verstappen’s dominance in the sport.

Ben Sulayem stressed he “cannot punish people” for winning, adding that getting involved to slow down the team would be “unfair”. He said: “If we go about what’s good and bad we’ll open the door. I mean, was it good for Mercedes? Fair enough?

“It is (Verstappen’s) time, it’s Red Bull’s time. What do we do … punish the good kid? No, let’s go and make the other teams good. Nobody’s stopping the other teams from being better. We cannot punish people for being better, for trying harder. That is unfair.”

It comes after Lewis Hamilton demanded FIA chiefs update the rules to stop Red Bull pulling away in 2024. In Austria, Hamilton suggested that bosses should consider updating regulations to stop teams working on next year’s cars before a certain date.

Christian Horner revealed some resources were already being piled into their RB20 to get ahead of the game. Hamilton stressed that Mercedes had never started work on a model this early in a campaign as he made a suggestion to officials.

He commented: “I think the FIA should probably put a time when everyone is allowed to start developing on the next year’s car. So August 1, that’s when everybody can start so then no one can get an advantage on the next year, cause that sucks.

“It would make more sense. They should. Say for example you start the season and you know you have a bad car, you can just say I’m not going to bother developing this car and put all this money into next year’s car and have an advantage.”

Verstappen took issue with Hamilton’s comments, calling out the seven-time champion over the remarks. Last month, Wolff claimed Verstappen’s commanding position “p***** him off” but accepted the Silver Arrows had work to do to close the gap.

He explained: “There is a meritocracy, [Red Bull] have just done the best job, the driver’s driving excellent and they are just far away. And that is something which only we have in our hands to get under control.”