12/08/2021
NEWS STORY
Days after having its request for a right to review of Sebastian Vettel's disqualification from the Hungarian GP rejected, Aston Martin has decided not to continue with its appeal.
In a brief statement issued today, the team said:
"Having considered our position and having noted the FIA stewards' verdict that there was clear new evidence of a fuel system failure, we have nonetheless withdrawn our appeal on the basis that we believe doing so outweighs the benefits of it being heard."
On Monday, rejecting the right to review, the FIA said: "In the original decision, the stewards only assumed the fact that there was not enough fuel in the tank. The question of what caused that situation was left out of consideration," it added, referring to the team's claim that the mandatory litre of fuel could not be extracted due to a faulty fuel system.
"The F1 Technical Regulations unequivocally call for a remaining amount of one litre and does not allow any exceptions under which circumstances or for what reasons it could be dispensed with.
"In order to be able to affirm a 'relevant' fact, Aston Martin would have had to present facts that actually more than one litre of fuel was remaining. The explanation why this requirement could not be met is not relevant to the decision as to whether a breach of the regulations has occurred."
In reaction, Aston Martin said: "Since the team's data indicated that there was more than 1.0 litre of fuel in the car after the race - 1.74 litres in fact - the team requested a right of review, as a result of having discovered what it deemed to be significant new evidence relevant to the sanction which was unavailable to it at the time of the FIA stewards' decision.
"That review has now been completed, and, while the FIA stewards accept the team's explanation of a fuel system failure as the cause of a leak resulting in an unexpected loss of fuel, their verdict was that the team's petition for review be denied on the basis that its new evidence was not relevant to the requirement to provide 1.0 litre of fuel."
"We felt that the evidence we presented was relevant," insisted Otmar Szafnauer, "and demonstrated to the FIA that (Sebastian) should have been reinstated following his disqualification.
"Unfortunately, the FIA took a different view and, despite the fact that that the accuracy of our new evidence was not contested, Sebastian's disqualification has been upheld on the basis that the new evidence was not deemed 'relevant'. That is disappointing, and we will now consider our position in respect of the full appeal process."