The stewards
The stewards are the judges of a Grand Prix weekend. When something goes wrong on track, whether it's a collision, a car speeding in the pit lane or a team breaking a technical rule, it's the stewards who decide if anyone broke the rules and what the penalty should be.
They are not the same people who run the race. The race director controls the session itself: flags, the safety car, red flags and the start. The race director can report incidents to the stewards, but only the stewards can hand out penalties.
Who sits on the panel
Every event has a panel of four or five stewards. The FIA appoints three or four of them, one of whom chairs the panel, and the national motorsport authority of the host country appoints one more from its own nationals.
One of the FIA's appointees is usually a former racing driver, known as the driver steward. Their job is to give the panel a racer's view of an incident: whether a move was realistic, whether a driver could have avoided a crash, how much a car really slides over a certain kerb. Past driver stewards include Derek Warwick, Johnny Herbert, Emanuele Pirro and Vitantonio Liuzzi, among many others.
The panel changes from race to race. The FIA rotates people through the role, which is one reason fans sometimes see similar incidents judged differently at different events.
How an investigation works
Most investigations start with a message on the timing screens and the TV graphics, such as "Car 4 and car 16, turn 1 incident, under investigation". The stewards can also note an incident themselves without any report.
Some investigations take seconds. Others are put off until after the session, especially if the stewards want to speak to the drivers. In that case the drivers and team representatives are summoned to the stewards' room for a hearing, where they can explain what happened and look at the footage together.
The stewards have plenty to look at. They have every TV angle, onboard cameras from all the cars, team radio, GPS positioning data and telemetry showing throttle, brake and steering inputs. That's why they can tell whether a driver lifted off under yellow flags, or braked unusually late into a corner.
How they decide
The rules say a driver can only be penalised if the stewards are clear that they were "wholly or predominantly" to blame. If both drivers share the fault more or less equally, or nobody did anything clearly wrong, the stewards can call it a racing incident and take no further action.
To keep decisions consistent, the FIA publishes two documents each year that the stewards work from:
- The penalty guidelines, which list common offences and the usual penalty for each. For example, causing a collision in a race normally gets a 10-second time penalty, reduced to 5 seconds if there are mitigating circumstances.
- The driving standards guidelines, which describe who has the right to a corner when two cars go side by side. More on these on the collisions page.
These are guidelines, not fixed tariffs. The stewards can go higher or lower depending on the circumstances, and they often do.
Decision documents
Every decision is published as an official document on the FIA website. It names the driver, the offence, the penalty and a short explanation of the stewards' reasoning. Reading a few is a quick way to learn how the rules work in practice.
Can the stewards change their mind?
Yes, in limited cases. A team can ask for a right of review if it has found significant new evidence. From 2026 the stewards can also reopen a decision themselves if new evidence comes to light. The appeals page explains how this works and what can and can't be challenged.
There is also a separate out-of-competition stewards panel of at least five experienced officials. It handles matters that can't wait for the next race weekend, such as something that comes up during the summer break, and usually meets by video call.