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Whiting says drivers are to blame for crashes at Silverstone

11:21, 12 Jul 2018

byBobby Vincent

Charlie Whiting says that the crashes that happened last weekend at Silverstone were because of the "driver choice" and not the DRS like some have suggested.

The FIA included a new third DRS zone at Silverstone and this included the Abbey and Farm corners.

This opened the possibility to speed through these corners with an open DRS.

Haas driver Romain Grosjean was brave enough to do this, however it didn't pay off for the Frenchman in Fridays practice as the Haas driver crashed straight into the barriers.

Sauber's Marcus Ericsson lost control at the same turn on Sunday.

Ericsson blamed it on his inability to close the car's DRS quick enough as he ended the race in the barriers.

"I think the incidents where drivers lost control through Turn 1 because they had their DRS open through Turn 1 is a driver choice, just like any other choice you make in a car," Whiting told F1i.com.

"It's like any car that is challenging to drivers, and sometimes they try to do it flat when it's not really flat, and they spin.

"It's the same thing, it's their choice. If they thought they could do it, they can try it. It's not a requirement to do it. It's like any other choice that teams and drivers make."

F1's race director did say however that the extra DRS zone did not benefit overtaking in the area.

"I don't think it actually helped," Whiting claimed.

"The idea was that drivers might get a little closer than they would have done otherwise and therefore be in a better position to attack on the straights between Turn 5 and 6."