Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race Results

Red Bull, Mercedes wary of Ferrari protest at Melbourne

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Red Bull and Mercedes are bracing themselves for official protests later this month about the legality of their 2017 cars.

Both teams are expecting rivals including Ferrari to make an official complaint to the FIA about allegedly illegal 'active suspension' systems. According to 2017's new technical rules 2017, any team using such suspension must prove that any aerodynamic boost is incidental.

While both Red Bull and Mercedes team bosses are confident their cars are within the rules, their rivals could still object. Ferrari team principal Maurizio Arrivabene has been particularly vocal about launching a protest.

"If Arrivabene wants to look a fool, he can quietly continue to work in this direction," a Mercedes source was quoted as saying by Auto Motor und Sport.

Such a formal protest about a car's legality can only take place during a Grand Prix weekend. The first race of the season is in Melbourne, Australia on March 26.

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"Our system was always legal, so this clarification does not concern us," insisted Mercedes boss Toto Wolff. "I think it's the usual posing before the season starts.

"If someone wants to file a protest then they should file a protest. I think it's pretty clear: we don't go anywhere near what we see as dangerous territory," he added. "There may be other teams that have stretched the rules a little bit, we don't know."

Christian Horner said that the problem was the vagueness of the relevant regulation's wording.

"The FIA seems to be happy with the way we have interpreted the rules. If anyone has problems with that, they have the right to protest," he said.

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.