Why did Mercedes protest Max Verstappen winning the F1 championship?

Max Verstappen picked up his very first championship triumph in Formula 1 after a last-lap overtake on Lewis Hamilton at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. The route which the Red Bull driver used to do that, however, has brought a lot of controversy to the sport of Formula 1.

Max Verstappen, who qualified on pole on Saturday to the surprise of everyone, lost the initiative at the start of the race when Lewis Hamilton had a better launch off the line and was able to maintain the lead.

Verstappen did try to take the lead after a late lunge at the end of the main straight but with Hamilton’s excursion off track not penalized, the Briton was still able to hold on to the lead in the race.

With Mercedes seemingly having the pace to comfortably gap the field, Hamilton was in control of the race with Verstappen trying everything at his disposal to claw back the advantage and put up a fight.

By lap 50, it was starting to look like Lewis Hamilton had the title in the bag, but a late-race safety car on lap 52 allowed Max Verstappen to pit and put on fresh soft tires with Mercedes banking on the fact that the race might end under the safety car.

On lap 57, to the utter bewilderment of everyone, the race director put out the message that lapped cars will not be allowed to overtake before the SC restart at the end of the lap. The decision would have meant Max Verstappen would have to clear multiple backmarkers between himself and Lewis Hamilton and then overtake the Mercedes on the last lap of the race if he was to win the championship. All of this seemed virtually impossible.

But this was not the end of the drama we’ve had this season as just a moment later, an entirely new directive was issued in which only the lapped cars between Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen were asked to overtake the leaders which left Hamilton exposed on worn-out tires to defend against Verstappen who had fresh soft tires at his disposal.

It was no surprise when Max Verstappen was able to pounce on Lewis Hamilton at the restart and pick up what was his first championship triumph.

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Why is Mercedes protesting against Max Verstappen and what will happen next?

Terming it mismanagement of the race, Mercedes protested against the process followed during the safety car restart. In ideal conditions, all the lapped cars are told to overtake the leaders and join at the back of the grid while in this scenario the safety car was called in on the same lap.

The initial Mercedes protest was dismissed by F1 stewards after a hearing was held later in the night on Sunday but Mercedes has lodged an intention to appeal against the decision. Regarding the protest, various pundits like Karun Chandhok feel that an action or a decision overturn does not seem like a viable solution in this case. Regardless, it would be interesting to see what happens as stranger things have already taken place this season.

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