Carlos Sainz criticised race control after the FIA admitted a "human error" had disadvantaged some teams during Sprint qualifying for the Singapore Grand Prix. The problem occurred in SQ1 while all 22 cars were on track.
After a red flag caused by Sergio Perez hitting the barrier, a timing system issue caused confusion over which six drivers were eliminated. The FIA later confirmed the sporting integrity of the session had been compromised.
FIA admits error
In a statement, the FIA said: "During the first period of Sprint qualifying there was a human error in race control unrelated to the timing issue also encountered in SQ1. This issue in question meant overtake mode was not available after the red flag period during SQ1."
"When it became apparent that overtake mode was not active after the restart, it was then activated for a period of 27 seconds before being deactivated again. The FIA acknowledges that this unfortunate human error had an impact on the performance of certain cars based on the timing of their run and their position around the lap. The second and third periods of Sprint qualifying were not affected."
Sainz reacts
The start of SQ2 was delayed while the FIA investigated. The session continued without Sainz, who was one of the six eliminated in SQ1. The Spaniard acknowledged his Williams may not have had the pace to progress but was frustrated by the handling.
Sainz said: "We unfortunately had a really poor lap. We only had one lap and we had some issues with the brakes. We had to change the brakes but I was having a few issues still, with the lock-ups. We were struggling a lot with that and with the tyres."
"On top of that, half of the cars did their lap with half-a-second quicker engines than the others. There was another software issue with the cars. This time around, we were on the bad end of it."
"For whatever reason, the FIA decided like in Malaysia didn't decide to do sporting equity and were happy to do half of the cars in quali with higher power than the other half of the cars. I'm a bit confused why the sport keeps doing different things based on who is out in Q1."
"We did the whole lap with half a second less power than any other lap of the weekend. With all the other issues that we had, we would have always struggled to get through."
Max Verstappen took Sprint pole but was placed under investigation after Lewis Hamilton reported him to the stewards. It remains unclear whether any disadvantaged teams intend to protest the result.
