Sauber Launch Internal Investigation on F1 Disqualification

When Sergio Perez and Kamui Kobayashi crossed the finish line of the Australian Grand Prix in 7th and 8th place, respectively, Peter Sauber was arguably one of the happiest men in the paddock. A few minutes later, following the FIA post-race verification, it was confirmed however that both cars fielded by the Swiss team did not comply with some articles of the FIA's technical book and were consequently disqualified from the race.

To be more precise, the uppermost part of the rear wing was in question, as it was found in breach of Articles 3.10.1 and 3.10.2 of the F1 Technical Regulations, which marks as illegal “a local concave radius of curvature smaller than 100mm” on the rear wing.

The first thing any team would do under the circumstances would be to lodge an appeal to the decision. However, according to Sauber technical director James Key, an internal investigation was already launched at the Hinwil headquarters, in order to find out whether the wing was build under the rules of the FIA.

“We didn't know anything about it until after the race,” said Key after the race. “It's possibly an oversight, certainly not intentional, and is nothing to do with F-ducts or anything else that circumvents the regulations. It is also not performance enhancing, as what happens on top of the element is incidental.”

“How it has arisen needs to be investigated internally, and that is the process that we now need to go through,” he added.

What's interesting is that the Swiss team had come to Melbourne with several configurations of their rear wing, but eventually decided to go with the one that didn't pass the tests.