Carlos Sainz backs wet Miami GP but warns safety concerns remain

Carlos Sainz has backed racing in wet conditions at the Miami Grand Prix — but insists safety must remain the priority.

His comments came as the FIA announced that it had “a contingency plan in place” should Mother Nature want the final say on Sunday.

Carlos Sainz supports wet Miami Grand Prix with safety warning

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Heavy thunderstorms are forecast for Sunday’s 57-lap Miami Grand Prix, with an up to 85 per cent chance of it bucketing down during the race.

An FIA spokesperson said: “We are closely monitoring the weather forecast for this weekend.

“Having faced a similar situation last year in Miami with threats of thunderstorms, we have a contingency plan in place and will activate it if needed to minimise disruption to the on-track [program].”

Safety, for both the FIA and the drivers, is paramount.

Already, motorsport’s governing body has announced that boost mode will be banned in the rain, stating it “will be inhibited and is not allowed”, while Straight Line Mode will also be adjusted with “only partial activation” permitted.

The teams will be allowed to increase the temperature of the tyre blankets for the intermediate tyres, with all three decisions made on safety grounds.

Sainz says he supports that after last year’s Sprint got off to a delayed start because of standing water on the track.

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“As we saw last year, on the straights, a lot of standing water here,” the Williams driver told PlanetF1.com and other media. “It’s a super-flat track, the water stays on the surface and whether that’s going to be safe enough or not, with the walls close to you and the visibility that we have with these cars, it is certainly going to be a concern.

“But yeah, I hope that we can take all the appropriate actions for it. We can have a good show, a good race.

“I think all drivers want to drive in the wet,” he continued. “Wet races are a lot of fun. Me, the first one, you guys know I love the wet.

“But hopefully with the right system and tools in place to make it safe. Also, there’s this lightning risk that I don’t know what will happen with. There are a few things, like the SLM in the wet only at the front, that I really don’t understand why we have that if it doesn’t reduce the drag much.

“So yeah, a few things to analyse, to put together, if Sunday is going to be wet.”

Championship leader Kimi Antonelli believes it could be tricky racing the new generation of cars in the rain, with the Mercedes driver having only experienced it once during the team’s shakedown back in January.

“I drove the car when we did the shakedown in Silverstone in the wet and definitely it was very tricky,” he said. “Although now with the changes, they clipped the power to 250 kilowatts for the wet and no boost, so that’s already a step forward in that regard.

“Definitely I think it’s going to be tricky, because there will be a lot of unknown, and obviously we’re also going to be racing if the wet weather presents. But I think also another big topic is that we will need to increase tyre blanket temperatures for the wet because I think as they are now, probably they will be a bit too low for the conditions.

“It’s going to be interesting to see, tricky, but let’s see. If it’s thunderstorms, like they say, we probably also won’t get under way for quite a bit of time. So, let’s see how that goes.

“But definitely it’s going to be very interesting because there’s so much unknown in the wet at the moment, especially no one really used the inter tyres, so we don’t know how it’s going to feel, how much grip there will be, especially with the new regulation.”

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher

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