Red Flag Restarts
VerifiedWhat happens after a session stops under red flag: how the grid resets, and what teams are allowed to change before it goes again.
When a red flag stops a race, cars queue up in the pit lane or return to the grid, and the restart is usually a standing start from the order the field was running in when the red flag came out, not a rolling restart behind a safety car.
A red flag stoppage briefly suspends the usual parc fermé restrictions: teams get a window to make repairs, and in wet conditions, to change tyres or make some setup adjustments they couldn't touch under normal parc fermé rules.
If a red flag comes out very early in a race, how much of the original race distance is left can affect whether the result still counts as a full points-scoring race; the exact thresholds have changed across different seasons' regulations.