McLaren Make Appeal To FIA Over Max Verstappen Incident At Brazilian GP

McLaren have reportedly contacted the FIA after Red Bull's Max Verstappen finished in third place in the Brazilian Grand Prix.

Verstappen was knocked out in Q1 and qualified in 16th position on what was an unusually difficult Saturday for his side of the Red Bull garage.

Red Bull took the opportunity to fit the Dutchman with a new power unit, with the new parts exceeding his season allowances and forcing him to start from the pit lane as a result.

The four-time Drivers' Champion produced an inspired drive to move up to third place by the chequered flag - despite an early-race puncture which forced him to pit under the virtual safety car.

Although he is now 49 points behind championship leader Lando Norris, who won for McLaren, with three Grands Prix and a sprint race remaining, Verstappen can still win the title even if Norris wins one of the remaining races.

Teams swapping out engine parts and exceeding their allocation is not normally debated any further, given that each driver is given a significant grid penalty for each violation.

But according to The Race, McLaren are said to have raised questions about the FIA's guidance on engine changes in relation to the cost cap.

It is claimed that the Woking-based outfit believe that, if an engine swap is made for purely performance-based reasons, rather than because of damage or reliability issues, then the cost of the swap should fall under the cost cap.

McLaren team principal Andrea Stella told reporters that he would be 'interested' in knowing whether Red Bull's engine swap would be counted in the cost cap, adding: "If the engine was changed for performance reasons, it should go in the cost cap."

There is no indication that, were the engine swap to be counted, Red Bull would be close to violating the cost cap limit for 2025, as such data is not collected or published by the FIA until next year when all teams have formally submitted their accounts.

SPORTbible have contacted the FIA for comment.

It is also unclear as to exactly how much the engine swap would have benefitted Red Bull, as they also made significant set-up changes after Verstappen's complaints on Saturday.

The Dutchman told Sky Sports F1: "The car was all over the place, sliding around a lot. I had to under-drive it a lot just to not have a moment. That of course doesn't work in qualifying.

"We first have to analyse what is going on. I don't really understand how it can be this bad, so that's more important for us to understand that at the moment."