F1 faces new budget cap threat

F1 Fanatic Round-up

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In the round-up: New plans for a budget cap are being considered by F1 buyers Liberty Media.

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This weekend’s Caption Competition was won by Ruben:

“You’re the only one who’s faster downhill then Kvyat’s career.”
Ruben

Thanks to everyone who joined in this weekend in particular Strontium, B194 and Neil who all made great contributions.

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On this day in F1

Onofre Marimon was born on this day in 1923. The Argentinian racer was killed in practice for the German Grand Prix at the Nurburgring in 1954.

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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73 comments on “F1 faces new budget cap threat”

  1. Hahaha! That caption is just pure gold!

  2. I’m sure lots of my fellow readers will echo this, but instead of imposing a cost cap, why not go with a more equitable distribution of prize money? Isn’t that what the teams are complaining about anyway, especially the mid- and lower-tier teams? I’m an American, and you can see how such a system allows NFL to have relative parity in the league and close, exciting games on vast majority of Sundays.

    Also…

    “That money is not doing anything good for fans. It is just wasted on competing on technology….”

    This guy is smoking crack or hasn’t a clue what F1 is about.

    1. ColdFly F1 (@)
      19th December 2016, 1:16

      To make the competition more exciting you have to do both!

      I’d rather see them doing 3 things:
      1) equitable distribution of prize money;
      2) balanced budgets (easier to audit and control than cost caps);
      3) teams as part shareholders of commercial rights holder.

      1. More or less an NFL model.

    2. OmarRoncal - Go Seb!!! (@)
      19th December 2016, 1:49

      @thepostalserviceisbroke I think that technology shouldn’t be so obvious in F1. I mean, those steering wheels should be limited to, let’s say, 5 buttons (Radio, Pit Limiter, Extinguisher, and 2 functions the driver can choose)

      1. @omarr-pepper Bernie? Is that you?

      2. @omarr-pepper

        If they went to 5 buttons on the steering wheel, the cars would become undriveable. The sheer amount of mode changes required to drive this highly complex car/power unit package means that those buttons are required. If its not under the driver’s control, then it will be on the pit wall, which means you dont really achieve anything.

        The fact is, as long as this PU formula remains, F1 will be complex. Making it easier would not be possible. Considering the investment made by the manufacturers, it would be quite impossible to revert back to a simpler formula without facing their wrath.

        Equal distribution of funds will be a start, but then you’d have the problem of keeping the works teams (and Red Bull) happy. Consider that the whole premise of Renault’s decision to return as a works team was based on getting more revenue (should they meet certain criteria). Due to the cloak and dagger nature of Bernie’s dealings with teams, nobody really knows what contractually exists between both parties….and this would make any real change in the near future very difficult.

        This makes managing F1’s commercial aspects akin to a bear riding a tri-cycle on beach ball whilst balancing 10 ft pole on its head!

        1. Wrong. The standard ECU is what forces teams to put that volume of switches and controls on the steering wheel.

          Allow more powerful processing onboard, allow the car to make more decisions for itself and we would have dramatic reduction in redundant and 1 purpose switches.

          This doesn’t mean traction control, autopilot, or any such nonsense. But throttle position and behavior alone could help dictate pit entry mode for instance.

        2. @jaymenon10 good points about Bernie. They’ll have to let all those deals lapse before there’s a “real” concord agreement.

        3. @jaymenon10 I do not agree about the buttons. The cars _as they are set up now_ would be undrivable, but that is precisely the point. So far there was little motivation to set them up differently. Allegedly, we ended up with the complex “power units” as a way to make F1 more relevant to the future of automotive industry. When was the last time you or I had to switch between modes every second turn when driving for family holiday? I am pretty sure that if F1 teams were resctricted to 5 buttons, we would quickly see advanced software taking care of what is necessary. I imagine that software would be less efficient at the start, it should learn quickly. So this would in fact be another benefit for manufacturers, why should they be unhappy?

          I think the other part of your post is spot on.

        4. whoosh! Yes if you take the buttons off you would…if you didn’t change other areas to counter that fact. Take the buttons off, turn the computers off. Bored of this ‘technological marvel’. I want to see racing

      3. My two buttons would be 200% Power Boost and Laser Gun.
        And Extinguisher would operate the one in my team-mate’s car.

      4. You make it sound like they put them there just to be obtuse.

      5. Put Cortana in the car and there’s no need for buttons anymore.

    3. There are two or three payments made to teams depending on various factors.
      If one starts with the total income of the F1 Commercial Rights Holder’s profit, half that, less 2.5%, is to be paid to the teams, this is then split in half again. So we are talking about two roughly quarter shares of the original Commercial Right Holder’s profit. The first “Quarter share” (actually about 23.75% or a pool of $427M) is called “Equal share” and is distributed to equally to each team, meaning each team in 2015 got about $42.5M. I’m not sure whether Marussia / Manor got this amount or not, or if Caterham got that payment instead.
      The second “Quarter share” is then distributed based upon Merit, which is what we’d equate with Prize money. So the team that won the Constructors Championship got the most ($76.5M in 2015) and the team that came last got least ($14M in 2015).
      So, as you can see, every team got a partial payment for turning up and a partial payment for performance, but then some teams get a third payment, which is from one of 3 pools. Ferrari get the 2.5% deduction from the total half of the Commercial Rights Holder’s profit that was distributed to the teams mentioned above, and they get another 2.5% from the half of the income that the Commercial Rights Holder’s profit that wasn’t distributed to all the teams, so Ferrari get a 5% payment of the total Commercial Rights Holder’s profit ($90M in 2015). Then there are two other sources of payouts: 1) “Historical Payments”; and “Constructors Championship Fund” payouts. The Historical Payments is 3.3% of the Commercial Rights Holder’s profit and is equally paid to Williams (arguably the oldest team in F1) and Mercedes (arguably one of the younger teams in F1). Both teams received $30M in 2015. The Constructor’s Championship Fund is 7.5% of the Commercial Rights Holder’s profit, and was unequally paid out to Ferrari ($21.2M), Red Bull Racing ($78.9M), and McLaren ($34.6M).
      I think this third section of payouts should be abolished. It seems to be farcical that Mercedes, who have entered 148 races, get this payment on the basis they had some cars compete in F1 in 1954, while Sauber, who have entered 424 races, Renault (324 races), and Force India (171 races) don’t get a bean.
      There is another aspect to this which isn’t obvious at first glance, and that is what was an obvious unequal amount of TV air time during a race. Sauber and Manor are the examples that come to my mind, they would get hardly any air time during a race, while Mercedes, Red Bull, and Ferrari got lots of it. The impression I got is there was some moves made to correct this during this season. When F1 was on Free to Air TV in many countries this would equate to lots of extra income from advertising for those teams with lots of TV air time, and less extra income for those with little TV air time, but in this era of Pay Wall TV the income from advertising is much less, meaning there is less income to be derived from corporate advertising regardless of whether the team gets lots of TV air time or little.
      I think the idea of a budget cap would be good as long as there aren’t any exceptions. My suspicion is the third tier of payments might be exempted, which is ludicrous. It would be far better to get rid of the third tier of payments and to simply pay the “Equal share” and “Merit” payments made. This would be far simpler (contractual obligations aside) for Liberty to implement.
      http://www.totalsportek.com/f1/formula-1-prize-money/

      1. You forgot the 5% off the top that Ferrari gets before the rest is split into the three categories.

        1. Ferrari get the 2.5% deduction from the total half of the Commercial Rights Holder’s profit that was distributed to the teams mentioned above, and they get another 2.5% from the half of the income that the Commercial Rights Holder’s profit that wasn’t distributed to all the teams, so Ferrari get a 5% payment of the total Commercial Rights Holder’s profit ($90M in 2015).

      2. – It seems to be farcical that Mercedes, who have entered 148 races, get this payment on the basis they had some cars compete in F1 in 1954, while Sauber, who have entered 424 races, Renault (324 races), and Force India (171 races) don’t get a bean.

        Quite an extraordinary method of money distribution and rewards – if one can use that term, in Formula 1.
        The new owner of the franchise sounds like he might make changes but if you read closely, you would see that he ended up saying he would seek an audience and possibly approval with MERC, Ferr, RB, Mcl and Williams before any major financial changes are made. In other words, the status quo is likely to remain at least for the foreseeable future.
        Happy Holidays and Merry Xmas in advanvce to everyone BTW:)

        1. Mercedes gets 30 million for that. It’s not just based on number of races either.

          If anything is farcical then it’s that Ferrari gets $100 milllion extra (plus veto) since 1997 (!) and Red Bull gets $80 million for stabbing FOTA in the back

    4. The NFL cap is only for player salaries, thus it’s much easier to impose and regulate. The teams are free to do any additional spending they want on facilities, staff etc,. This is not comparable to imposing a budget cap in F1.

  3. Yes (@come-on-kubica)
    19th December 2016, 0:15

    Seriously Lewis, just shut up at this point. Get over it. I really wish the Merc is an absolute dog next year or your car constantly fails and you fail to get any sort of success next year. Sick of this spoilt brat now.

    1. If you’re sick of it then just ignore it. You’re being a complete hipocrite as every time Hamilton is mentioned you comment the same negative things. Hamilton is asked a question to which he provides an answer. You then comment negatively on his answer. It’s a never ending circle but you’re doing the exact same thing !

    2. How is he spoilt?

      Just because McLaren put their arm around him? Because he’s earned a lot of money and likes to spend it? Because he likes to party? Because he gets in the papers (and ergo gets F1 into the papers)?

      How is that more spoilt than having Daddy’s company pay for his sons seat?!! How is getting a seat by having so much money you can pay for it, rather than someone getting through erm, driving talent? I realise this is a F1 financial problem, but it is still the case.

    3. Michael (@freelittlebirds)
      19th December 2016, 0:34

      @come-on-kubica

      I really wish … your car constantly fails and you fail to get any sort of success next year.

      But isn’t that what happened this year? How bad do you want his car to fail? ;-)

      1. LOL

        When I think bad reliability, I look back at Mansell’s stats in 1988
        OK some of it self-inflicted, but really, only finished 2 races :D

        1. In those days cars failed a lot more often. That’s why they could scrap their worst result over the season. That would sort of compensate for the huge amount of mechanical problems they had at the time.

    4. Retire already and good riddance!!

    5. @come-on-kubica Mate, Robert’s not coming back to F1. Maybe you need to go watch WRC – he turns up there a lot and there’s no Lewis Hamilton to cause you so much grief.

    6. You getting sick of someone else talking sounds like you have a little bit of that trait in you too

    7. Lewis, you earn respect but you can also earn disrespect. You publicly show contempt for your team who don’t deserve it. Fourteen hundred highly-skilled individuals came together to provide you with the most dominant F1 car in history. And you continue to show an incredible selfish disregard for them.
      If I was a member of the Mercedes team I would now want you out. Alonso, Vettel, Ricciardo, Verstappen, Sainz would all do at least as good a job as you, and would be much better to work with. Perez, Hulkenberg, Grosjean, Bottas, Kimi would all be capable of winning the WDC in your car, and would all be much better to work with. The rest of the grid would all win races in that car, and I now regard every single one of them as better to work with than you.
      Yes, you are talented. But you’re also an extreme egoist who is rapidly losing the respect of many for your inability to cope with being beaten. You say the right words when you win and come across as a gracious winner. How about attempting the same now, try to be a gracious loser. Please show some respect for Nico and please, please show some respect for all of those people who gave you such a fantastic car.

    8. Yes (@come-on-kubica)
      20th December 2016, 0:52

      Oh look, its the lewis defence brigade. As silly as Lewis himself. All of you just through unnecessary personal attacks at me and not a single reason why lewis shouldn’t shut up.

      1. Single reason why Lewis shouldn’t shut up: he’s an accomplished F1 driver with better insight into the sport than any of us, really, and people want to hear what he has to say. Coincidentally, that might be the reason why journalists ask him questions. Although just for kicks maybe he should answer one of those questions with: “I really can’t speak about that. An anonymous dude on the internet told me to shut up.”

        Now, can we get a single reason why @come-on-kubica shouldn’t shut up?

  4. I could swear that FIA had to relinquish its control of the commercial aspects of F1 in order to appease monopoly and anti-competition regulations, but all I saw since then, is F1’s commercial rights holder meddling into the sporting side of F1. Teams budgets are part of the competition aspect of F1, not its commercial side, and therefor, commercial rights holder has no business interfering with teams finances. Their only worry should be to maximize the turnaround for the teams and FIA, but like every financial institution which produces ZERO value, they are trying to steal 100% of the profits if possible.

    1. Team budgets are very much part of the commercial side of the sport Biggsy. And as for the anti-competition authorities, they will all have been happy to tell the FIA and Liberty to sort things out more satisfactory than they are now, and will get back once a new structure is put in place.

  5. The thing about spending in F1 is that it is all relative. If I were in John Malone and the FIA’s position, I would restrict how much the teams could spend on chassis and aero development. But as for the engine manufacturers, there would be no restrictions (with the exception of Ferrari, Merc and Renault; they would be restricted in chassis and aero development like all the other specialist teams). I remember when BMW was making something like 600 F1 engines a year in 2004- half of which were used for racing and the other half were used for R&D. BMW, Honda, Renault and any other major manufacturer has to make their own decisions on how committed they want to be. They are such huge organizations, have so much money and so much influence that they don’t need to be looked after- they are entirely capable of looking after themselves. The specialist teams- McLaren, Williams, Force India, Haas- those are far smaller organizations with far less influence and money, and they need to be backed up in case anything goes wrong.

    1. mfreire, that figure of 600 engines per year sounds far, far too high – Cosworth stated that they were producing about 100 engines a year at most in that era, and they were supplying multiple teams.

      If you are saying that half of those engines (about 300) were being used by the race team, the BMW-Williams team would have had to have been using over 16 engines per race weekend (there were 18 races that season) – a figure that is impossible given the engine development restrictions which were in place that season.

      Since 2004 was the year in which they first introduced engine life rules (the engine had to last for an entire race weekend) then, for an 18 race season, you would need a minimum of 36 engines for a two car team – allowing for spare engines and development mules makes a figure like 60 seem reasonably credible, but 600 does not sound remotely realistic.

      1. Anon- for someone who knows as much as you do about racing, I am disappointed. That figure is right, believe me. You will be as amazed as I was. When Max Mosley was interviewed by Steve Rider for Architects of F1, he said that BMW were producing that amount of engines per season. Also, check out this link:

        https://books.google.com/books?id=AZKFLcLybIMC&pg=PA295&lpg=PA295&dq=bmw+f1+2004+number+of+engines+produced&source=bl&ots=o3QpWSjVRh&sig=DVfoQFhe88fMzA7x5Ct1b0xnCvA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi8gsWAmoHRAhVi4IMKHWnbCk0Q6AEIYzAH#v=onepage&q=bmw%20f1%202004%20number%20of%20engines%20produced&f=false

        1. Sorry- it was 2003, not 2004.

  6. Nice caption. SFI has always been a solid team, that said it feels like a miracle to see them on the grid after these past couple seasons of financial insecurity, not only that seeing them perform.

  7. Michelle Mouton is spot on in her interview. Shame that she doesnt get interviewed more often.

    Here’s the part that I dont quite get. If there was a female racer in junior categories that actually proving to be competitive, would it not be easier to secure sponsorship? Providing she is good enough, the girl would stand out among the boys almost instantly, and this would be a marketers dream, no?

    Perhaps there isnt a female in the junior categories that is good enough to back?

    1. That is exactly right. Perhaps early on there is some bias. But if one could distinguish herself sponsorship would be forthcoming.

      It is likely women are physiologicallty disadvantaged enough that very few can compete in f1. But until we’ve seen more it is hard to tell. We haven’t seen the F1 equivalent of Danica Patrick yet.

      1. It is likely women are physiologicallty disadvantaged enough that very few can compete in f1.

        That was most likely true a few decades ago, but with the progresses in physical preparation and the evolution of F1 I’m not sure it still is. Just a few years back there were all these talks about how lighter and shorter F1 drivers had an inherent advantage over the others and how the most taxing part of an F1 driver’s physical preparation was keeping their weight as low as possible. This is definitely an area were women have a physiological advantage over men.

        1. retak, I also wonder whether the physiological aspect is a misnomer – after all, Desire Wilson showed that she was pretty competitive when she raced in the 1980’s in sportscars and the 1981 South African GP (even if the race was stripped of championship status), and that was an era which wasn’t exactly renowned for forgiving race cars.

          She is the only other female driver to win a race in an FIA sanctioned series, I believe, with victories in the 1000km races at Silverstone and Monza, nor did she seem to suffer from the same anxieties that Mouton mentioned at Le Mans (Wilson raced a Group C Porsche 956 – a much faster car than the S2.0 car that Mouton raced at Le Mans). She didn’t seem to have any of the physiological issues that Mouton raises, which makes me wonder if perhaps Mouton is projecting her personal experience onto those of other female racing drivers.

        2. Physiological includes things like reaction time, which women have lower averages. The distribution matters, but it means fewer women will have the reflexes to drive a F1 car.

          Physically, yes the barriers are lower. But they still matter, as they add another obstacle to any potential driver.

    2. @jaymenon10 my guess is there’s only a finite amount of capital around for junior driver sponsorship and no woman has unfortunately caught the eye of someone with deep enough pockets. Red Bull have dallied with a few, but that programme is so hopefully cut-throat I wouldn’t recommend it for a woman – Helmut Marko is bad enough with the young men he pushes around and frequently destroys.

      1. @optimaximal, it certainly does seem to be true that, at the moment, very few female racers have been able to secure the necessary financial backing and support from an organisation that can provide driver coaching.

        Part of that does seem to be the difficulty in funding a junior career to the point where a driver could potentially start to attract attention from the operators of young driver programs. Equally, there is also the fact that the number of female racing drivers is still quite limited – perhaps due to social factors as well as the sheer cost implications being a major deterrent – such that the likelihood of there being enough female racing drivers making it to a major series is fairly low.

    3. the only potential candidate I have seen is Sophia Flörsch
      made a big impact in UK in Ginetta Juniors (and I mean the good type of impact !)and appears to be doing OK in Formula 4 AFAICT
      Has a good starting point have done Karting from 5
      Good camera presence aswell :D

  8. How unusual to see a line in my language (Czech) here. Also, I didn’t even know that website. You sure got your sources well covered!

  9. “Lewis still looking for some answers” would be my chosen quote from that channel 4 special.

    1. :-) Tristan. I think he is putting in a bit of press negotiation over gaining no. 1 status in the team really.

  10. Budget caps!! These idiots will do anything they can to stop Max winning multiple world championships. Its not fair that other good drivers have had this and nce Max arrives who is obviously so much better than the rest they want to rig it against him. And he is still a teenager and he is so good nobody can believe it and he will win multiple championships

    1. If he’s the second coming of Senna that he’s hyped up to be, wouldn’t that benefit him? Budget caps would bring every team closer, so the driver would become a more important factor.

  11. in the hope of levelling the playing field

    Fantastic. We really needed these guys to run F1. The restrictions that are in place now are literally the reason why one team has dominated F1 for the last 7 years. It will only get worse with a budget limit.

    I really hope that at some point a substitute dir the tobacco sponsors will come along and we can finally geht rid of all the limitations, especially the testing ban.

    1. And the unrestricted testing was the reason we had 1 team dominate for 5 years in the early 2000’s

      Musical rulebooks isn’t helping. The 2009 set of rules gave us a really tight field other than 2011. 2013 still had a good mix of winners early on, but ultimately teams switched off early ready for the 2014 rules, and before the teams could converge on those rules they’ve already been scrapped.

  12. Well, budget caps are impossible to impose.

    Example, Mercedes clutch problems were sent to entire Damlier group, how much is that worth in dollars?

    Fair revenue distribution, more shared aero devices…

    IMHO, front and rear wings should be standard…. That would equalise performance.

    1. @jureo Agree. Fair revenue distribution is the main thing F1 should change first.
      And budged caps is not efficient on today regulation that allow Haas-Ferrari shareable development. Something Toro Rosso said will be use as reference in 2018 with Red Bull.
      On the other hand, team budged caps with no cost split restriction might push Mercedes and McLaren to buy junior team. Maybe that’s a good thing.

    2. I agree. Personally I think they should first start with some of the things that result in higher spending, like exotic metals and carbon fiber (although CF may not be much more expensive than other things now).

    3. Nonsense, they know what it costs. If it’s done by another party they will have to present a fair value.

      It’s like saying companies cannot do their tax forms because they might “cheat” on those.

      Or while we’re at it, “F1 cannot have technical rules since the teams will try to circumvent them”. At the very least it will level the playing field by a huge amount. Perhaps not 100%, but still. If a team does find a loophole, just as with the technical regulations, it will get closed.

  13. That caption from Ruben is gold. LOL!

    Up to a new F1 season. It is already itching!

  14. “You’re the only one who’s faster downhill THANn Kvyat’s career.”

    I would have thought the grammar would at least be corrected. It makes no sense otherwise.

    1. What about spelling? ;)

  15. It is worth mentioning firmly that Liberty will, when the remaining share deals for Delta Topco have been completed, be the majority shareholder in the remainder of the 100 year lease of the commercial rights. They will not own the sport, that remains the property of the FIA.

    Any new rules will have to be agreed by the FIA even though Todt has muddied the view with his acceptance of shares from FOM (possibly on behalf of the FIA were he authorised so to do) and 6 seats in the F1Strategy Group, a body the existence of which, many of us believe breaks the original EU Commission’s ruling on F1. Still Todt has little or no interest in F1 and should do as he originally promised and appoint a vice president to oversee it.

  16. impressive by grosjean

  17. justthinkkngoutloud
    19th December 2016, 11:28

    What is Liberty doing anyway? All seems status quo. What with a pending Eu investigation, unrest amongst the teams, dropping interest in f1, surprise surprise all of a sudden, Liberty the saviour of F1 to the rescue…
    I thought at the time, and still suspect, that Liberty were providing a way for Bernie to advance his own agenda. As usual.

  18. It’s funny how the choice of title in relation to the content of the article in question was chosen.

    I would have said:

    F1 faces new budget cap promiss

    :)

  19. A budget cap threat? This is no threat, it’s a treat(couldn’t resist). This is the best thing that could happen to F1. Cap the budget and free up the technical regulations and we may have the real F1 back again. Provided a way is found to police the cap properly, of course.

  20. “I felt quite disrespected by the team. Oh, hi Toto. I didn’t realize you were here. Thanks. Next time put more milk on my tea, ok?”

  21. The budget cap is the antithesis of what Formula 1 is all about.

    The budget cap is a bigger problem than any solutions it is purported to provide. Those suggesting it are only proving how little they truly understand F1. Unless anyone really believes that accountants, audits, bookkeeping/spending penalties and lawyers are more exciting than action on the racetrack.

    A budget cap or unlimited spending do not in and of themselves provide better competition. Ask Toyota.

    1. Oh not again with the: “There was one team who failed to win even though they had a big budget. That is proof that budget doesn’t matter at all!!!!”

      The big teams now have budgets that are 3 to 4 times as much as the midfield teams. Could it perhaps be a tiny bit possible that if that gap was reduced, the midfield teams would be more able to compete? Just possibly maybe?

      1. @patrickl – Apologies, reply posted below.

  22. @patrickl – In 2013 the Lotus team achieved a win and podiums with a minuscule budget in comparison to Red Bull, Mercedes, Ferrari and McLaren. Lotus beat McLaren in the Constructor’s championship by a fair margin and nearly tied Ferrari for third. They did this without a budget cap. They applied their lesser resources in a greater way than their competitors. That is what F1 is all about. Toyota may be the most classic example of doing the opposite, but they are not alone. How many years have Ferrari had the greatest budget with very poor results to show for it?

    If the budget cap is employed it will be a massive waste of resources that will be taken out of racing development and sent down a rabbit hole filled with regulations, bookkeeping, accountants, cheating, policing, enforcement, penalties, lawyers, courtrooms and all around deceit and mayhem that have nothing to with actual racing. There is no simple method of accountability that can be set up even though some will proclaim that there is. Think about it. Different multinational corporations with different accounting methods and legal reporting requirements within their local and national jurisdictions. Different corporate layers upon layers depending on team, manufacturer, business model and structure set up for their own desires and purposes, not for easy F1 spending monitoring. It would take huge amounts of money to unravel the labyrinths of dealings for each F1 team and their associated businesses just to provide anything close to possible proof of spending amounts.

    It might be argued that F1 teams must change their business model or corporate structure for easier spending policing if they wish to stay in F1. That will chase some teams away. How will that improve F1?

    Who will pay for these regulations, accounting, policing and enforcement? Not the FIA. Not FOM. Not Liberty. The teams would have to pay for this through fees, less prize money or some other method that will surely come out of their pockets. Whatever ridiculous amount of money that would be spent will be money not spent on car development, personnel and racing. Wouldn’t this have the opposite of the intended effect? Increasing prize money to the teams would do more toward making F1 more fair and sustainable if that is what Liberty is truly interested in accomplishing.

    The whole focus of F1 would shift away from racing and into the corporate boardrooms to find out who is cheating, who is not, what penalties will be given for overspending, how to apply penalties (retroactive penalties against already decided results or to be applied to future results?) and myriad other issues that will simply tear the sport apart.

    All the time, energy and money wasted on a budget cap would be so much better spent on improving the sport in a positive way, not self destructive. Sometimes the best intended plans have a way of causing the worst possible results. We should be careful what we wish for.

    1. You should try to get familiar with the concept of “probability”. It’s not about the one exception.

      If anything is a massive waste of resources then it’s the way things are run now. They cannot change the things that actually make a difference, but they have to get more performance out of small things where it costs hundreds of millions to eek a few tenths out.

      Stricter budget regulations and less strict technical regulations would improve diversity, improve racing (or at least variability) and reduce the waste enormously.

  23. @patrickl

    If anything is a massive waste of resources then it’s the way things are run now. They cannot change the things that actually make a difference, but they have to get more performance out of small things where it costs hundreds of millions to eek a few tenths out.

    This much I can agree with. Current F1 front wings a prime example are ridiculous in cost and what is allowed by regulations for an extremely marginal return. I was quite disappointed that 2017 aero regs were not simplified for cost reduction and for closer racing purposes. For sure technical regulations changes could greatly reduce costs and improve racing, but that is not what is being done.

    My ‘probability’ logic tells me it is extremely improbable, next to impossible, that Mercedes AMG, Ferrari, Red Bull and McLaren will ever adapt their corporate business models and financial reporting in such a way to comply with any real F1 budget cap regulations and accompanying policing/probing into their delicate areas. It does not suit their purposes and they would likely leave F1 before complying.

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