The FIA has introduced a maximum time between Safety Car lines ahead of qualifying day for the Italian Grand Prix to allay concerns regarding slow-moving traffic. Drivers came to almost a complete stop at various areas of the Monza lap in Friday practice as to find suitable space for their flying attempts, as well as attempting not to provide a valuable slipstream to rivals. With the high-speed nature of the circuit, the turbulent air effect is greater than at other venues, which offers itself to traffic chaos. Farcical scenes ruined Q1 in 2020 and Q3 in 2019, whilst this weekend there has been contact between cars in both F3 and F2 qualifying. In F1 practice, Red Bull duo Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez were both infuriated by traffic issues on the run to Ascari and Alboreto [formerly the Parabolica], but now FIA Race Director Niels Wittich has moved to avoid potential safety concerns. In an updated version of his event-specific briefing notes, Wittich sets out: "For the safe and orderly conduct of the Event, other than in exceptional circumstances accepted as such by the Stewards, any driver that exceeds 1min 41sec from the Second Safety Car Line to the First Safety Car Line on ANY lap during and after the end of the qualifying session, including in-laps and out-laps, may be deemed to be going unnecessarily slowly." Any driver found to have breached the time could face punishment post-session.
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