The Grand Prix Commission, composed of Carmelo Ezpeleta (CEO of Dorna), Ignacio Verneda (CEO of the FIM), Hervé Poncharal (IRTA) and Takanao Tsubouchi (MSMA), with the participation of Javier Alonso (Dorna) and Mike Trimby ( IRTA, Secretary of the meeting, met several times electronically during the month of February.
Several sporting and disciplinary decisions have been made, direct consequences of the incident which took place at Sepang between Marc Marquez and Valentino Rossi last season.
Abolition of 4 and 7 penalty points
Announced last month, Dorna is no longer part of decisions concerning sanctions imposed on one or more pilots. A set of commissioners, appointed MotoGP Stewards Panel, will be responsible for deciding penalties which do not depend solely on the facts. A driver may appeal a sanction to the MotoGP Court of Appeal who will have 4 days to decide.
At the same time, the sanctions associated with the accumulation of 4 and 7 penalty points no longer exist. Only disqualification represented by 10 points will continue to exist. Once the disqualification is applied, the driver's points counter will be reset to zero. Please note that the points accumulated are always valid for a period of 365 days.
Do not tarnish the image of the Championship
In addition to the changes on the disciplinary level, the Grand Prix Commission has ruled on the sporting behavior of drivers and teams.
From now on, drivers or teams will no longer be able to make statements or press releases deemed harmful to the championship. Criticism is always allowed, but it must be responsible.
Other new features
Previously, overtaking under a yellow flag resulted in the loss of places in the standings. From today, it will be possible to apply other sanctions, of which the loss of places in the ranking will always be part.
The starting procedure has been changed when the rain will appear as soon as the drivers have finished their warm-up lap. From now on, the time for this procedure will be reduced, but will allow sufficient time to change machines.
