Scrutineering plays a vital part in ensuring racing is safe, fair and fun, and the British Grand Prix weekend gives the Motorsport UK Scrutineers the opportunity to participate on the world stage
FEATURE
KEEPING THE GRID IN CHECK
Scrutineering plays a vital part in ensuring racing is safe, fair and fun, and the British Grand Prix weekend gives the Motorsport UK Scrutineers the opportunity to participate on the world stage
Every year, a group of around 45 world-leading scrutineers comes together at Silverstone to oversee the UK’ s flagship motorsport meeting, the British Grand Prix, overseeing the validity of all 20 cars and driver’ s safety equipment on the F1 grid, plus the up-and-coming racers on the F2, F3 and, F4 grids.
Leader of the team is Chief Scrutineer Phil Mason, a volunteer with more than 30 years of experience, who took over from previous long-term Chief Peter Riches two years ago.
“ In F1, following the teams’ declarations, the FIA puts an authorisation sticker on all the cars, and the scrutineering team comes in on the Friday to become garage observers. We assign one scrutineer to each of the cars, whose job it is to stay with them throughout the weekend. We have a few others in the pits to support, and we also assign groups of scrutineers to all the other formulae.”
In the F1 paddock, 20 scrutineers are allocated to each of the F1 cars and will stick like glue to their allocated garage throughout the weekend. They make a record of everything that has been done on the car – from suspension changes and part replacements to tyre changes and wing adjustments – to ensure everything runs by the rules.
“ We work closely with Jo Bauer, the Technical Delegate for the FIA, to verify everything that happens during the weekend,” explains Mason.“ The FIA has a self-declaration approach, which is similar to the approach Motorsport UK and some of the organising Clubs in the UK are moving towards, although at a Club event we still check at least 25 per cent of the entry.
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Revolution- October 2025