F1 safety hot topic for Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber chat at Goodwood

Sebastian Vettel revealed that he and former Red Bull teammate Mark Webber had a conversation regarding F1 safety while at Goodwood.

The four-time F1 World Champion was in attendance at the Goodwood Festival of Speed in the UK last weekend, driving his own privately-owned Williams FW14B and McLaren MP4/8 up the hill to highlight the use of sustainable synthetic fuels.

Also in attendance at the event was former Red Bull teammate Mark Webber, who took part in the Porsche showrun as an ambassador driver, with the pair having a chat about Formula 1 during their downtime on Saturday evening.

Sebastian Vettel: There are always things to learn with regard to safety

With Saturday’s action at Goodwood called off due to extreme weather conditions around the area, Vettel and Webber had had the chance to catch up. Webber retired from F1 at the end of 2013, with Vettel staying on in the sport until the end of 2022.

While the pair didn’t get along particularly well as teammates, their relationship warmed as age matured Vettel and allowed them to reconnect as Webber remained involved in F1 as a broadcaster and driver agent (on behalf of Oscar Piastri).

Additional reporting by Sam Cooper.

Speaking to media, including PlanetF1.com, Vettel was asked about the areas of safety F1 needs to target.

“As soon as you have speeds involved, there’s always a risk,” he said.

“That’s something that you probably will never be able to fully eliminate. But you try to control it as much as you can.

“If you look at the cars that I will use today, a lot of cars that are out here today – we’ve come a long, long way.

“If you look at the tracks, we’ve come a long, long way. But there are all types of accidents that you maybe haven’t thought of yet, freak accidents that can have a very bad outcome.

“We have to make sure we learn from them. We’ve had obviously, two [recent] crashes at Spa that were fatal. One in 2019, one this year.”

PlanetF1.com建议

F1 records: The drivers with the longest points-scoring streaks in history

Motorsport Triple Crown explained: Its prestigious races, history and only winner

Sebastian Vettel: Safety should always be the number one priority

Vettel, whose comments were made on the eighth anniversary weekend of the sad loss of Jules Bianchi, who had been part of the Ferrari Driver Academy when the German arrived at the Scuderia, was referring to the accidents at Spa that claimed the lives of Formula 2 racer Anthoine Hubert (in 2019), and that of Dutch 18-year-old Dilano van ‘t Hoff earlier this month.

“There’s definitely stuff that we have to keep improving. It’s very difficult to give you one example or to pick one,” he said, detailing how the rising weight of contemporary F1 machine is a big concern.

“我们(马克-韦伯) had a conversation last night also with a lot of people, and we were talking about the cars, the dimensions of the cars, and the weight of the cars.

“One thing that you underestimate, in general, is, when you make cars heavier, it is also becoming more dangerous. You need bigger run-offs, and you just have more weight, and more mass, which needs to ultimately slow down when you hit something or crash into something.

“In the whole debate of where we’re going something that we mustn’t forget. But it is difficult because there are lots of different interests. But safety should always be the number one.

“Even if we can avoid an injury.”

Vettel, who had tested out the Aeroscreen solution to cockpit safety during the FIA’s trials six years ago, said he had not been initially a fan of the Halo concept, but had been convinced by seeing its effect on saving drivers from injuries.

“There was a big debate around the Halo, I think now it has completely disappeared for good reasons,” he said.

“I have to admit I was not a fan of it when it was introduced because I thought it didn’t look right and it did feel a bit weird. But the upsides outweigh the downsides, by far more.

“Yeah, it’s progress. And probably, if you ask some people that were racing in the 1970s and ’80s, they’ll be like, ‘What are they complaining about? They should have raced in our cars and then see how dangerous it was.’

“That’s not the point of view that we should have. There is always progress and you have to make sure that it will continue to progress.”

Read Next:Sebastian Vettel fears worldwide government bans on F1 and motorsport