Carlos Sainz disagrees with Lewis Hamilton, Max Verstappen over Belgian GP start delays

Williams F1 driver Carlos Sainz has defended race director Rui Marques over the delayed start to the Belgian Grand Prix.

Sunday’s race at Spa-Francorchamps didn’t get underway until 4:20pm local time - 80 minutes after the scheduled race start.

One formation lap behind the Safety Car took place to assess the conditions but Marques felt visibility was too poor.

This decision irked Max Verstappen in particular, who said over team radio at the time: “Well that’s a bit silly, I mean, you should just run a few laps, jesus.

“They’re way too cautious, now the heavy rain is coming, and then it’s gonna be a 3 hour delay.”

As the race was red-flagged, there was no more rain for approximately 20 minutes.

While it was likely the race would have been halted after 10 laps, some racing could have been done in the wet.

The race resumed significantly later, with race control still adopting a cautious approach behind the Safety Car.

By the time the race got underway, it didn’t take long for drivers to consider a switch to dry tyres.

Lewis Hamilton also felt that the start delays were unnecessary.

Sainz said he had “respect” for race director Marques because of tough decision he took to take his time with the resumption of the race.

“In a normal track, yes, I think we could have started maybe 5-10 minutes earlier. In Spa-Francorchamps and the history of this track, it’s better safe than [sorry],” Sainz said.

“You guys got the whole race, you got to watch the full race, so I don’t think it was a bad call, a safe call, but my respect to the race director because he told us after Silverstone and the accidents in Silverstone that he would play it safer here and that’s what he did.

“That’s why better safe than have an accident and be regretful.”

A tough Sunday for Sainz

Sainz’s Belgian GP was a tale of two halves.

He enjoyed a strong sprint race, finishing just behind Haas’ Esteban Ocon to finish sixth.

However, an early exit in qualifying led to a pit lane start, as Williams made a raft of changes.

With conditions unsuited to a full wet setup, Sainz struggled to progress in the midfield.

“We basically elected to start from the pitlane after, I think, yesterday in quali we did some... I think we went in the wrong direction with the set-up, and we were seeing something in the car that was worth a change in park ferme to change the car,” Sainz explained.

“That gave us also the opportunity to put a rear wing for the wet in case it was a full wet race, and the gamble didn’t pay off.”