To everyone saying there's no point in the CAS appeal and it's unsportsmanlike, I disagree and here's why.
I believe that Max deserves the WDC and he should not be stripped of it for no fault of his own. I also believe that the stewards have been doing an abysmal job, not just this race but throughout the season. This race, where they deliberately announced "lapped cars will NOT be allowed to overtake", breaking at least 6+ years of precedent, and then went back on it 2 laps later in a manner that broke their own, written rule stating that the SC enters the pits the lap AFTER the lapped cars are allowed to overtake. Their rebuttal is even more nonsensical, it amounts to - "but the 'Safety Car in this lap' message was displayed, and that means it has to enter this lap"...who made the call to display that message? Was it not Race Direction?
They could have :
1) Not announced the first decision because it made no sense given the track conditions or what was happening behind the SC, we don't know how they arrived at that decision but clearly they agree that it was the wrong one. Let lapped cars overtake on lap 56, SC enters on lap 57, maybe Lewis pits sometime after the first decision was announced and returns way behind, maybe he doesn't and loses the fight on track, but it's a fair way to do it considering the reason why the SC was deployed (Latifi's car crashed, was cleared by lap 55, marshals could have gotten out by the end of lap 56) and not considering the outcome of the SC on the title fight - which is what the FIA are supposed to do. Max would still have been WDC, no controversy, just bad luck for Mercedes.
2) Stuck to the decision to not allow lapped cars to overtake, because they're the Race Directors and what they say goes in accordance with the rulebook. (I mean, when was the last time they overturned a decision?). SC enters the pits at the end of lap 57, as is their prerogative. Hamilton has a chance of winning the WDC, Red Bull are fuming at this decision that breaks so much precedent, but it's far less controversial than what we got.
3) Ended the race under a safety car. No one wants to see this settle a world championship, but it's not controversial, happens quite often. Someone almost always wins with a safety car, and for that someone to win someone else has to lose.
All 3 of the above decisions would have made someone unhappy, but if there wasn't enough time to do options 1 or 2, there isn't enough time to end the safety car in my opinion. It is a SAFETY car, you'd expect them to stick to the regulations. Whether you agree with me so far, I definitely hope that we can agree that safety car decisions should NOT be rushed. And this comes at the end of a season full of comically poor decisions.
I watched a video recently of Hamilton and Massa's clashes in 2011, and in that every time one of them as much as touched the other's barge boards, they would get a 10 second penalty. This whole season is testament to that not being followed anymore. Silverstone should have been given a bigger penalty, although I'm not sure by how much. Spa 2008 - Hamilton overtook Kimi the corner after Hamilton gave back the position, and was hit with a drive-through penalty. The way Max was playing with giving back the position and later overtook Lewis after giving back the position the first time, it didn't look like they were too worried about that.
The Brazil overtaking incident wasn't investigated, so Max and Max fans would have felt wronged when he did the same thing in Jeddah and had to hand the place back. Championship leader Vettel accidentally drove into Lewis during the Safety Car in Baku 2017 at less than 80km/hr and got hit with a 10 second stop-and-go penalty, the most severe penalty there is. Max slowed from 295km/hr to 100km/hr, hit the brakes with 2.4G of deceleration (as enthusiasts on Team-BHP, we can understand what a big number that is), hard enough to lock up his rear wheels under full RACING conditions on the back straight of a street circuit (they don't slow down that much or that abruptly even under a safety car), and got away with a 10 second time penalty for that. Bottas not being investigated for driving too slowly under the safety car in Jeddah and slowing Max down by more than 8 seconds before the first pit stop. Turn 6 of lap 1 in Abu Dhabi. Spa 2021, a 'race' that that left fans freezing in the rain for 4 hours to see 3 laps of a safety car.
I'm sure there are more incidents where Max came off worse that I can't remember. My point is that the stewarding is all over the place, threatening to compromise the integrity of the sport, and now we get this where they can overrule their own rules saying "Well it's okay because I said so.", in a situation where none of this was necessary as they could have solved it in accordance with the rules, with precedent, in more than 2 other ways? Sainz in P3 had lapped cars in between him and P2. Ricciardo and Stroll were P12 and P13 with fresh softs. They could have done some damage, maybe finished in the points, but their competitors were handed a free lap under Michael "It's called motor racing" Masi.
The stewards shouldn't be out there to provide a show. They should be out there to enforce the rules, maintain the integrity of the sport and keep everyone safe. And Max fan or not, that's clearly changing now.
I hope Merc take the FIA to court and that there is an outcome that doesn't strip Max of the WDC that he deserves, but I strongly believe Masi has to be reprimanded in some way. You go to the FIA when you believe your competitors don't follow the rules - who do you go to when the FIA don't follow their own, written rules?
![Confused](https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/images/smilies/confused.png)
I believe they have to fight this out in court to preserve the integrity of the sport. I would still believe that if it were Red Bull who'd come off worse today. And I'm honestly surprised that none of the other manufacturers are protesting.