The situation is this: we now have an entry list for the 2010 Formula One World Championship. On it are all of the current teams – five of them conditionally plus three new teams, plucked from an apparent 15 entries that the FIA received in response to its recent invitation.
The reality is this: we are no further forward, no nearer to solving the inherent problem that the FOTA contingent has, that being that a) the bigger spenders cannot slash their spending to the required levels in the given time and b) the manufacturers, and others, are unhappy with the manner in which the FIA are prone to playing with the regulations at their will.
Many have taken John Howett's comments about FOTA seeking proper governance as a move away from the financial issues: they are not, as it was improper governance – the declaration of the 2010 regulations, not even discussed with the teams, at a meeting intended for something else entirely, and the attendant advancing of the entry date – that got us where we are today. Which is, of course, in a right mess.
All the petty squabbling about F1 being able to survive without Ferrari should be wholeheartedly ignored: it can’t.
All the nonsense about manufacturers running the sport should be ignored: they haven’t.
What is running this sport, this sport that I love, is the continued ignorance shown by those in charge at the FIA as to what is good for the future of Formula One.
Yes, I understand that the manufacturers are using F1 as a showcase for their wares, but that has been done for 100 years. In 1906, the very first race to be acknowledged as a Grand Prix was won by a Renault.
Yes, I understand that costs are too high and have to come down. But wait, who on earth thought that introducing a set of rules that were deliberately aimed at hampering the bigger teams was going to prolong the existence of F1, was going to give it sustainability on the world stage?
It made no sense – then or now – and recent murmurings that Mosley was willing to scrap the two tier rule, in return for FOTA dropping some of their conditions, will not have gone down well with the new teams (and more of them later).
There are currently ten teams racing in Formula One: if the FIA were to agree to listen to the teams, to raise the budget cap for next season with a view to a continuing reduction in costs – something FOTA is very willing to do – and also to look at the issues of governance that FOTA want reviewed, then there would be ten teams, guaranteed, on the grid next year. What’s that you say? There will be ten teams next year, as the entry list features a whopping thirteen!
It does, and it’s interesting to say the least. Let’s get one thing straight, though – Ferrari, Red Bull and Toro Rosso are there because the FIA wants them to be, because it claims they are contractually bound. So what: how do you physically make them race?
So, of course, without those three, we still have ten teams, you say. Well, no, we don’t, because McLaren-Mercedes, Brawn GP, Toyota, Renault and BMW-Sauber are all on the list provisionally – they must drop their conditions, or they are not allowed to play.
Max Mosley has given the renegade five until next Friday to agree: the problem is, they won’t, and he knows that very well. So why does he bother? Why does he not just admit that, and sit down with them, and come to an amicable agreement? Is he too stubborn, too proud?
Probably, but the other side of the coin is that he might seriously believe that the way forward for F1 is to get rid of the motor manufacturers, and bring in new blood. He might, but I don’t. I think it’s utterly preposterous, and not the thinking of a supposedly super intelligent man.
This is why I believe there is something odd, something very fishy, about the entries we have seen today. The appearance of Ferrari and the Red Bull pair was an expected formality: the appearance of USF1 equally so. What is very odd is that the other two new teams are Manor GP and Campos. Actually, what is very odd – indeed – is that the other two teams are not Prodrive and Lola.
There may be a very good explanation for this apparent anomaly; the FIA has admitted it is still ‘in discussions’ with other entrants, in case the FOTA teams refuse to budge. As the general consensus has been that the teams ‘most likely to’ – from the known entrants – have always been named as Prodrive, Lola, Epsilon Euskadi, and USF1, it is curious that neither of the first three has been accepted.
Mosley is a canny player, and he will know that FOTA take those teams far more seriously than they do Manor GP, and as such he is trying to keep the pressure on, to force the FOTA teams to worry that, in fact, there are sufficient credible entries to fill an F1 grid without them.
There aren’t, so they will not be worried.
Litespeed, March, Brabham, Superfund are all very distant chances, and the rest none entities. It’s no contest.
The problem is that Mosley won’t budge, and the FOTA contingent won’t budge, but there is one man who can do something about this, and needs to, very quickly. Bernie Ecclestone needs to admit that the FIA is in a losing position, and is about to devalue his product, and he needs to declare his weight behind FOTA. Many see Ecclestone as a villain in the piece – and to some extent he may be – but at least he has been astute enough to admit, openly, that Ferrari is essential to the very fabric of F1.
It boils down to the old unstoppable force/unmovable object conundrum, yet there is one answer to the problem – what does happen when an unstoppable force hits an unmovable object?
The unstoppable force stops, and the unmovable object moves.
Quite simple, when you think about it.
Written by 3 on Fri, 12 Jun 2009 15:12:08
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