Marko questions decision to start F1 qualifying after five crashes

Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko has questioned the decision to host qualifying for the Sao Paulo Grand Prix after various on-track incidents.

One-quarter of the field made contact with the wall during the session, which was postponed from Saturday due to heavy rainfall.

Both Williams’ and Aston Martins sustained terminal damage during the session, as did the Ferrari of Carlos Sainz.

Speaking to Viaplay, Marko probed the decision to get the session underway in such wet conditions.

“Qualifying, five cars crashed, some of them really heavily,” he said. “I don’t know if that was the right decision.”

Red Bull suffered a disastrous session with Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez dropping out in Q2.

Both Verstappen and Horner voiced annoyance over how long it took to deploy the red flag after Stroll’s crash – a viewpoint shared by Marko.

“A lot of things happened, we are last in the pit lane, then [Esteban] Ocon came in between [the cars]. 

“On top of that, it took more than 30 seconds for the red flag to come out. The other accident with [Fernando] Alonso, the red flag came out immediately.

“It’s really annoying because we had a car that could fight at the top. This circumstance dropped us out.”