The Australian Grand Prix race stewards will do everything they can to make sure that all the drivers take part in the opening race of the season.
This means that the stewards will look at every driver on merit during the race weekend and if they have fallen outside of the 107% rule, then they may well be permitted to race regardless.
‘The 107 per cent rule was introduced to make sure that teams that were not capable of producing a good car that was of the required performance would not get into the actual races,’ Formula One race director Charlie Whiting explained to Autosport Magazine.
This rule has led some in the media to question if we will see all 22 cars take to the track in Australia.
Winter testing has proven that whilst the likes of Mercedes have shown excellent performance, some of the other teams, particularly powered by Renault have struggled not only for reliability but also pace since the dramatic regulation changes at the end of last year.
The switch from v8’s to hybrid turo-charged v6’s has caused more problems than probably expected.
Whiting continued: ‘What we have out here are 11 teams who we know are capable, but they may be suffering a temporary performance loss.
‘I am sure the stewards will look very sympathetically on any team that does not make the 107 per cent.
‘There is a mechanism within the rules to allow that to be done under exceptional circumstances. It doesn’t always have to be because a driver set a suitable time in a previous session.’
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Stewards to be lenient in Australia
