Red Bull's former Formula 1 sporting director Jonathan Wheatley says he would have handled Max Verstappen's Saudi Arabian Grand Prix Turn 1 incident differently if he was still running things there.
Verstappen picked up a five-second time penalty for gaining an unfair advantage after he skipped across the run-off area at the opening corner in his bid to stay ahead of McLaren's Oscar Piastri.
With Red Bull not instructing Verstappen to give the position back, his antics triggered a stewards' investigation that resulted in him getting a sanction that ultimately cost him victory.
Wheatley, who is now Sauber team principal, was previously a Red Bull stalwart and was most famously on the pitwall back in 2021 when Verstappen was handed a similar penalty in Saudi Arabia for cutting across the runoff in his battle with Lewis Hamilton.
The F1 veteran suggests that he would not have allowed things to play out in the way they did on Sunday if he was still in his old role.
That would likely have meant Red Bull using its own initiative to give the position back to Piastri, which would then have reset things for Verstappen in the fight for the lead.
Wheatley thinks that such a course of action was obvious because of the lessons that Red Bull should have had after last year's United States Grand Prix, when Lando Norris was penalised for overtaking Verstappen around the outside of a run off area in their fight for position.
Asked about what his thoughts were on the way Red Bull handled things in Saudi Arabia this time, Wheatley replied: "Oh I know what my thoughts were! I would have done something different, or advised to do something differently.
"I don't want anyone commenting on what we [Sauber] would do as a team. I don't want to comment on what other people would do, but in our team, we would have handled it differently, and certainly had a conversation about doing something different.
"It was the other way around, but it was a little bit like Turn 12 in Texas last year. So I think there were some lessons learned from that."
The debate over the Piastri/Verstappen incident has revolved around the racing guidelines that drivers operate to, which dictate when a driver has the right to a corner.
However, despite these having helped clear up confusion in certain situations, Wheatley is mindful that every racing situation is unique – so there will never be a catch-all solution that gets rid of all controversies.
"I don't think I've ever seen two identical incidents," he said. "It's such a dynamic situation, overtaking.
"You've got to take into account the tyre compounds. You've got to take into account if somebody's got a run on another driver. You've got to take into account if a driver's got DRS or another driver's got DRS.
"It's such a dynamic situation and then through all of that and all of the gamesmanship that goes on, you have to pick a braking point.
"There have been situations where I've had conversations with drivers I've worked with, where I've said 'you could have given him another 2cm there and it would've made the stewards' lives a bit easier'.
"The stewards have to decide if you've left a car's width or what have you. I love that element of the sport and I think the FIA and the drivers have worked really, really hard on the racing rules that we're working to at the moment."
One of the factors at play in the Saudi Arabian GP is that the Turn 1 corner configuration invites situations where drivers are squeezed out and left with no room if they try to hold on around the outside.
This means that the kind of incident that played out, of Verstappen cutting across the runoff, is common because there is no major deterrent against it.
Asked if he felt that the corner design was an issue, Wheatley said: "If there's gravel there, there's a slightly different approach. It's just entirely human. If there's an opportunity to run off the track and then sort it out later, we've seen that before as well.
"I don't want to be a 20/20 hindsight merchant, but I never really looked at that corner and for instance thought it needed gravel. Whereas I always looked at Turn 12 at Austin and thought that needed a solution."
McLaren doesn't understand the fuss
While Verstappen's penalty has triggered controversy and angered Red Bull, from McLaren's perspective the situation is one that seems clear cut.
It is in no doubt that Piastri had fully earned the right to the corner after his better getaway from the front row – and it suggests that Red Bull should have taken a leaf out of its own book and realised that giving the position back was the only way to avoid a potential stewards' penalty.
This is what McLaren did in the Bahrain Grand Prix last week when it instructed Lando Norris to give back a place to Lewis Hamilton after he had gained it off track, even if there was an argument to suggest he had been forced wide.
More on the Jeddah penalty controversy
- Mark Hughes: Verstappen had Piastri beaten if he'd been let off
- The evidence Red Bull thought was compelling
- Verstappen's 'say nothing' rationale
- The stewards' reasoning
- Our verdict on the row
McLaren team boss Andrea Stella said: "The situation in corner one was very close, in fairness. But you know, this is a business of small margins.
"This time Oscar, thanks to a very good launch off the grid and thanks to positioning the car on the inside slightly, ahead of Max, and managing to keep the car within the track limits, he gained the rights.
"Obviously in that situation, you can't overtake off track. So I think the case is very clear. And like we did with Lando in Bahrain, you may remember that we realised that we were overtaking [Lewis] Hamilton off the track.
"Even if kind of Hamilton drove us off the track, but he's Lewis Hamilton, he knows how to race, for us we just needed to instruct the driver to give the position back. So I think this is a clear case."
Stella argued there should be zero debate about what happened, and cited racing fairly as a key quality Piastri is showing this year.
"It shouldn't create any polemic, really," he said. "If anything, I want to take the opportunity to emphasise how well Oscar is racing. It is clean racing, it is tough racing and extremely precise."
