Michael’s first experience as a race official at a Formula 1 Grand Prix was eventful.
The Wednesday stated off quiet at Flag Post 5.8 with the Porsche customer drives in the morning and safety car and medical car practice laps in the afternoon.
The rest of the weekend was spent at Flag Post 7.5 as an intervention marshal. Saturday was extremely hot with a maximum temperature of 35C, but a cold change came in over night with heavy rain and the temperature reducing throughout the day on Sunday to just 14C during the race. Due to the weather, one flag marshal was unable to continue on the Sunday and Michael got upgraded from intervention marshal to flag marshal.
With incidents occurring during the customer laps prior to racing (multiple cars aquaplaned into walls), many race events being cancelled, and Formula 1 drivers hitting the wall on the warm-up lap, it was no surprise that an incident occurred at Michael’s flag post – Fernando Alonso spun on the exit of Turn 7 and impacted the wall approximately 2m shy of Flag Post 7.5.
