Brawn: F1 'foolish' to waste chance to refine rules

Formula 1's managing director of motorsport Ross Brawn says that it would be a foolish waste not to use the delays caused by the outbreak of coronavirus as an opportunity to reassess and refine forthcoming rule changes.

The sport was due to introduce a major package of sporting and technical reforms for 2021, but the pandemic has already caused that to be pushed back a year to help teams cope with the financial repercussions.

F1 bosses have also been busy hammering out a series of 'Return to Racing' reforms to address the threat of an outbreak of the virus in the paddock and pit lane once the season starts in Austria next month.

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Brawn says that the sport should now use some of the lessons learned from the cost-cutting measures should be applied to the 2022 rule changes.

"I think we could look at the regulations going forward based on what we've learned," he told Motorsport.com.

"One interesting aspect is this year of extra time that's given us the chance to re-assess some of the areas that the teams were concerned with regarding the new regulations.

"We're not going to waste that time, he continued. "It would be foolish to sit on our hands for 12 months, so why not refine the design of the 2022 car while we've got the opportunity?"

He said that now was the perfect opportunity, as preparations for the start of the this year's season meant that no one was currently working as far ahead as 2022.

"It's not big changes," he added. "It's things that people have highlighted where there's an ambiguity, or they can see ways of getting round the objective of the regulations, or not achieving the objective of the regulations.

"We're going to use those 12 months to refine it," he stated. "And we're going to do the same with all the regulations for '22. We're going to look at the lessons learned from this process and see whether they might be applied."

Although coronavirus has disrupted plans and schedules in every part of life around the globe, F1 does still have some firm dates that it must adhere to.

With the new Concorde Agreement yet to be signed for 2021 and beyond, the FIA's International Sporting Code stipulates that technical regulations for 2022 must be agree by next week - June 30 - although that requirement was overridden last year by unanimous vote of the teams.

"The governance for '22 has not been agreed yet, so it would be the International Sporting Code," Brawn acknowledged. "The wording is a little bit open.

"We can make detail changes, but we can't make conceptual changes after the deadline," he said.

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