Red Bull's illegal front wing in Abu Dhabi may have been grounds for a race ban. That is the claim of Andy Green, the technical boss of
Force India, who thinks a team with a lower status in pitlane might have been punished very harshly by the governing FIA for a similar infraction.
After qualifying for the 2014 finale last Saturday, stewards disqualified both
Sebastian Vettel and
Daniel Ricciardo when their wing was found to be overly flexible. But Germany's Auto Motor und Sport claims it was not just the degree of flex that alarmed the FIA, but the fact that the wing was designed specifically to control the bending by way of a strip with built-in springs. Designer
Adrian Newey, however, insisted: "With other cars it was even worse --
Williams for example."
Williams denied its Abu Dhabi wings were illegal. Force India's technical boss Green, meanwhile, suggested that Red Bull had been pinged in a case of clear rule-breaking. "If this had happened to us, we would have been excluded like
BAR in 2005 with its hidden fuel tanks. But Red Bull only had to start from the pitlane. It was a less severe penalty for illegal wings than
Lotus had for
Romain Grosjean's legal engine change," he added.
On Twitter during the Abu Dhabi weekend, Force India supremo Vijay Mallya described Red Bull as "cheats". (GMM)
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