Formula One’s governing body – the FiA – has announced a management re-structuring ahead of the 2023 Formula 1 season, beginning with Steve Nielsen being tapped as the new F1 sporting director.
The 58-year-old Nielsen, a Briton, was previously [since 2017, when Liberty Media took control of F1] F1’s sporting director for commercial rights and will now oversee race-control operations, while Nikolas Tombazis – formerly the FiA’s single-seater technical director – has been promoted to single-seater director, a newly created position which puts him in charge of the FiA’s F1 operations.
Meanwhile, former McLaren technical director, Tim Goss, has been promoted from deputy director to become the FiA technical director.
Nielsen had already rejected a similar role twice – once when former, well-respected race director Charlie Whiting died in 2019 and then again when Australian former race director Michael Masi was sacked after he went rogue and caused the infamous 2021 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix fiasco which wrongly deprived Mercedes’ seven-time F1 world champion Lewis Hamilton from claiming his eighth world title.
Even after Masi’s sacking, F1 race management errors continued to occur in the 2022 season – most notably at the Monaco Grand Prix [start procedure], Italian Grand Prix [re-start procedure] and the Japanese Grand Prix [recovery vehicle issue plus point distribution issue].
Before holding his position for F1 commercial rights, Nielsen spent time in several roles with several F1 teams, including Lotus, Renault, Toro Rosso and Williams.