Zak Brown calls for Formula 1 steward system shake-up

Zak Brown says he would welcome full-time FIA race stewards and would accept McLaren paying a percentage towards their wages.

Currently, F1 stewards are unpaid volunteers and are only offered travel expenses to preside over races.

It has led to calls for F1’s governing body to employ ‘professional’ stewards to help improve consistency in their decision-making.

FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem is open to having permanent stewards but has raised the question as to who should pay for them, telling Autosport late in 2024 that “they [the drivers] don’t want to pay for it”.

Speaking at the Autosport Business Exchange: London, McLaren Racing CEO Brown stated his belief that it should fall upon the teams, along with the FIA and F1, to contribute, adding that he felt it important to have a professional body of stewards.

“The biggest thing we need to do is approach the stewarding system,” said Brown.

“To have part-time, unpaid stewards in a multi-billion-dollar sport where everything is on the line to make the right call…It is a technical job and when you get it right, no one says ‘great job’. But I don’t think we are set up for success by not having full-time stewards.

“The individuals are fine but the rulebook is too restrictive.

“I’d like us to take a step back, loosen it up. Have full time stewards who can make more of a subjective decision of whether that was right or wrong.

“As far as paying for the stewards, this will probably be unpopular amongst my fellow teams.

“I’m happy if McLaren and all the racing teams contribute. It’s so important for the sport.

“It can’t be that expensive if everybody contributes. It’s not going to break the bank.

“What I don’t know is what’s the relationship contractually between the FIA and Formula 1 as far as what’s the level of expectations on stewarding.

“But at the end of the day, the agreement says part-time stewarding is not paid. In any business, if you want something different, it’s called a change order and if you want to change something, you have to pay for it.

“So if we have to pay for it, in the big scheme of things I do not think it will be a significant amount.

“If it comes back to McLaren where you pay a percentage and what F1 will pay and what the FIA will pay, if you break up that fee, it is not that much but I think it is that important.”
McLaren won the constructors’ championship title last season for the first time in 26 years.

And Brown had been quick to pay tribute to the work done by McLaren’s team principal, Andrea Stella.

The Italian, who was confirmed as team boss in December 2022, but Brown revealed he first asked Stella to take control back in 2019.

He added: “I asked Andrea to become the team principal back in 2019 but he felt we were not ready yet.

“He has very little ego, so he’s not one of these individuals who jumps at the chance to be team principal. He just felt he wasn’t ready, even though I felt he was.

“So the second time around, I had the opportunity to make some changes and I convinced Andrea and it was not an immediate yes. He had to sleep on it over the weekend and get comfortable with it.

“But then when he jumped in and got real serious real quick. He identified that we were going to big problems, which I suspected hence the changes.”