Surprise! Red Bulls Marko now believes in halo protection for F1 drivers

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Red Bull Racing advisor Helmut Marko admits he was wrong about Formula 1’s cockpit protection innovation, commonly known as the Halo.

When the halo was made mandatory for 2018 and beyond, Red Bull’s top official vehemently opposed it. But despite denying that Max Verstappen intentionally collided with Lewis Hamilton in Monza, he says the incident shows that he was wrong about Halo.

Formula 1 has just released new onboard footage of the incident showing how Hamilton’s head was actually hit by the rear wheel of Verstappen’s Red Bull.

“I was skeptical at first,” said Marko of the Austrian newspaper. “But even I have to admit – just like the fire accident (Grosjean), the halo was one of the main reasons it went so well.”

Another new Halo proponent is the son of the late Niki Laudas, former racing driver Mathias Lauda.

“These two guys are really not giving each other a thing, are they?” he said Servus TV when asked about Verstappen and Hamilton. “The titanium halo protection did exactly what it was supposed to – it protected Hamilton from the rear wheel of Verstappen’s car. It didn’t look too bad at first, but when you see these repetitions you know it could have been very bad without Halo. “

The Halo is designed to keep debris off the cockpit and head of the driver.

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However, 40-year-old Lauda said the only reason Verstappen and Hamilton were even wheel to wheel at that moment was because of the botched Red Bull pit stop, which lasted nearly 11 seconds.

“It was a disaster,” said Lauda. “Seven or eight seconds is an eternity in Formula 1. If you want to fight for the world championship, that mustn’t happen.”

However, Lauda denies that Verstappen collided on purpose. Formula 1 stewards blamed Verstappen and gave him a three-place penalty for the next race.

“If they hadn’t crashed there, Lewis might have hit Max later,” said Lauda. “The penalty will be a disadvantage for Max in the next race. In the extremely tight world championship, every little thing counts.”

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