The FIA hopes to further ‘professionalize’ its governing body through the establishment of a new officials department. This department is intended to assist in the training of more officials, including race stewards and race directors. The move appears to be a response to previous calls from Formula 1 for more consistent stewardship.
The FIA has been in the spotlight recently, and not always in a positive light. The governing body hopes that the establishment of the so-called officials department will train the next generation of officials. The FIA seems to be responding, in part, to repeated calls from figures such as George Russell and Zak Brown for the professionalization of the stewards.Nikolas Tombazis, FIA’s Director of Single-Seaters, views the department as the next step towards a more ‘professional’ governing body, and less reliance on volunteers. “It’s probably a bit unfair to rely on people doing it out of goodwill, and that’s what’s happening now,” Tombazis explains to Motorsport.com. The FIA hopes that the new department will “provide a body that can spend the Monday morning after a race analyzing every decision, to ensure it was made in the right way.”
Increasing Availability of Personnel
According to the FIA executive, the ultimate goal is to have more people available and more time freed up to analyze everything. “We feel that in Formula 1 we get quite a lot of commentary on the consistency of the stewards,” Tombazis continues. “I would like to add that there have also been analyses done, even by teams, which have indicated that the stewards are actually quite consistent. They are people who absolutely have a high level of expertise, but we don’t have as many available or trained as we would like.”
