Gabriel Bortoleto warns against 'creating another 10 problems' with solution to recent F1 issue

Gabriel Bortoleto has encouraged the FIA to resist sweeping changes to its safety car regulations in the wake of the British Grand Prix, warning that reactive rule modifications risk causing more harm than good.

The 52-lap race at Silverstone ended behind the safety car after Max Verstappen lost the rear of his Red Bull at Stowe on lap 48, spun into the gravel and became beached, triggering a late neutralisation with just four laps remaining.

With lapped cars given the instruction to overtake the safety car, Article B5.13.5 of the safety car regulations requires one full lap to be completed after the unlapping procedure before the safety car could come in — a rule that could well be looked at.

The "lapped cars may now overtake" message was sent after race leader Charles Leclerc had already started lap 51, meaning the safety car could only peel in at the end of lap 52, the final lap, making a green-flag restart impossible.

Confusion was amplified when a "Safety Car In This Lap" message briefly appeared on screens during the penultimate lap, raising the prospect of a last-lap shootout. The FIA subsequently confirmed: "The 'Safety Car In This Lap' message was displayed erroneously due to a software error."

Leclerc took the chequered flag for Ferrari ahead of George Russell and Lewis Hamilton. Bortoleto, who finished eighth for Audi, was candid about the controversy when asked for his view at Belgian Grand Prix media day.

"If there is no safety concern, there is no reason to keep the safety car out," Bortoleto told media, including RacingNews365.

"If I'm very honest with you, my race didn't change at all with or without the safety car. I was gonna probably finish in that position."

'Mistakes happen once in a while'

Bortoleto initially suggested the late-race messaging had been an error, before clarifying what he understood of the situation.

In fact, the safety car procedure itself was applied correctly under the regulations; it was the electronic message that was displayed in error due to the software glitch, and the safety car was then obliged to remain out for the final lap to comply with the unlapping rule.

"I heard it was a mistake, if I'm not wrong, what happened in the last lap," he said. "So I'm sure the FIA is not happy with these things, and they are gonna want to make changes to get it better.

"But I think the safety car rules and the virtual safety car rules have been working pretty decently in the last years, so I'm not too concerned about changing rules.

"I'm just aware that mistakes happen once in a while, and they happened unfortunately last weekend. Life moves on. I'm sure they are gonna try to fix it, and that's it."

The subject of whether lapped cars should be required to overtake the safety car, even when doing so costs additional laps at the end of a race, has been a recurring talking point since Silverstone. When pressed on whether the unlapping procedure is always necessary, the Brazilian acknowledged the nuance.

"If we are in a situation where we have a lot of laps in the race still left, I think it's good because you put everyone back again to race, and that's nice," he said.

"But I think when you are at the end of the race like this, and you risk not having enough time to put all the cars together, maybe it's not needed.

"But again, the visibility I have in the car, I don't have the wider picture like when you are watching from the outside, so if they take a decision, it's not up to me to judge them.

"But definitely, if this is one of the reasons why the race finished under a safety car, then it could have been avoided."

'We don't need only to focus on the entertainment'

Multiple drivers have weighed in on whether greater use of red flags could prevent safety car finishes on Thursday at Spa-Francorchamps.

Pierre Gasly confirmed that the drivers would raise the matter with the FIA during their briefing, with the aim of finding practical solutions to ensure races do not end under safety car conditions in the future.

Lewis Hamilton called for greater red flag "freedom," whilst George Russell offered what he described as "conflicting" views on the subject.

The Mercedes driver acknowledged that, with enough laps remaining, a red flag would be acceptable, but noted the flipside: a red flag in the final laps puts the race leader at a disadvantage, forcing a standing start when that leader, as Leclerc had at Silverstone, may have built a substantial gap.

Both Hamilton and Russell used the Australian Grand Prix in 2023, when a late-race red flag caused chaos, to illustrate their differing points of view.

Bortoleto, however, was unequivocal that red flags should remain reserved for serious incidents, not deployed simply for entertainment purposes.

"Let's make these things clear as well," he responded. "No, I think it's important that a red flag is when a big accident happens.

"We don't need to focus only on the entertainment to finish the race. We have 70 laps, 60 laps of the race; it's enough entertainment and enough laps.

"I think if there's a big accident that happens at the end of the race, I fully agree that we should get a red flag because that's a safety concern.

"But if it's a small accident like what happened to Max, where he didn't even crash, he just went to the gravel, I don't see a reason why we need a red flag there, just to try to make three more laps in the race.

"I think we should stick to: red flag, it's big accidents, structure in the barriers that went wrong or whatever; and yellow flags are for incidents like that [at Silverstone with Verstappen].

"Because as soon as we start to do this type of thing, things get mixed up, and then other problems are created. You know, 'why the red flag came up in this situation?'

"And then you create another 10 problems to try to fix something that happens once in 50 races."