Fired F1 race director breaks silence on his shock FIA exit

Former F1 race director Niels Wittich has finally spoken out about his sudden departure from the FIA.

On the eve of the 2024 Las Vegas Grand Prix, F1’s governing body announced that Wittich had left his role as race director with immediate effect with three races remaining in the season.

The move happened quickly with no explanation and came as a surprise to all, including F1 drivers who expressed their confusion about the German’s unexpected exit.

Breaking his silence during an appearance on Sky German’s coverage of pre-season testing in Bahrain, Wittich said he was given “no reason” for his dismissal.

"I saw no indications that anything wasn’t working or that there was any reason to make a personnel change,” Wittich explained.

“So, in that sense, it all came as a complete surprise. To this day.”

Asked if he had tried to get clarification from the FIA, Wittich replied: "I did, in fact. But no one could give me an answer.

"To this day, no reason has been given to me. And the last time I spoke with the FIA president was last year in China.

“So I can’t say that we had any kind of falling out or a negative relationship. I had relatively little contact with him."  

Rui Marques was installed as F1’s new race director with immediate effect.

“It was an incredible pleasure to work with such a fantastic team and to oversee such an amazing series,” Wittich added.

“Formula 1 can be quite fast-moving when it comes to personnel, whether on the team side or among officials. I just have to accept it for what it is."

Wittich's exit shocked F1 drivers 

Reacting to the news of Wittich’s axing, world champion Max Verstappen described it as a “weird” decision.

“I read the news and I just continued with my day... of course it is a bit weird with three races to go to do that,” Verstappen said at the time.

“It doesn’t matter if you are positive or negative about certain things, and I thought in Brazil, for example, there was definitely room for improvement, but it is still weird now having to deal with a different race director.

“Normally if you want to change a race director then do it after the season, and then you have a bit of time for the race director himself to get up to speed with things.

“Then you have pre-season testing, and you get into your role a bit more. But let’s see how it goes. They have decided it, and we have to deal with it.”

Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc revealed the drivers were not informed about the FIA’s decision, saying it “came out of nowhere”.

McLaren driver Oscar Piastri echoed Leclerc’s comments.

“I had no idea that anything was even being planned,” the Australian said. “I actually heard it from someone else, one of the other drivers, or an article somewhere. So it was definitely a bit of a surprise.

“I think on the whole, Niels was doing a reasonable job. I think there were some things that we wanted to improve, some things got better, some maybe didn't, but, yeah, I certainly don't think it warranted an immediate sacking. I don't know how it got phrased, but it seems like a bit of a different picture than how it was phrased, so I don’t know.”