Albert Park, 2019

Italy’s Coronavirus ‘lockdown’ may jeopardise season-opening F1 race

RaceFans Round-up

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In the round-up: Italy is preparing drastic new restrictions to contain the Coronavirus which could prevent staff from Ferrari and AlphaTauri attending the first race of the year in Melbourne.

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Comment of the day

Could the row over the FIA and Ferrari’s secret settlement cause problems for F1 owners Liberty Media?

Don’t forget that the Concorde Agreement still has not been sorted for 2021 or beyond. Without the ‘Magnificent Seven’ and a signed Concorde Agreement, there is no F1 for Liberty to market, there is no need for the FIA to officiate over F1 as there will be only an entry from Ferrari and their clones. Track owners and TV companies wont have a product to entice spectators or viewers.

Without the Concorde Agreement the ‘Magnificent Seven’ can ride off into the sunset and start their own (probably European-based) series with the track owners. Call it any formula that will put bums on seats.

Another thought is that if Mercedes, Honda and Renault were looking for a reason not to continue in F1, here is a pretty good one.

F1 is not about who is in charge, all the partners are mutually dependent (highly co-dependent in fact) upon each other. One cannot function without all the other parties being on board.

The ‘Magnificent Seven’ plus the track owners have more options to develop an alternative race series, Liberty and the FIA not as many.
Gerrit

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On this day in F1

  • On this day in 1986 Frank Williams suffered paralysis in a road car accident in France

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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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44 comments on “Italy’s Coronavirus ‘lockdown’ may jeopardise season-opening F1 race”

  1. COTD. Excellent, but it has been this way before and always the teams (Ferrari excepted) got screwed over. The problem for all teams, bar the manufacturers, is that they cannot afford a year without a guaranteed income and Bernie in his infinite wisdom ensured it stayed that way.

    1. Excellent? Interesting? yes — but it misses the most important point in the “Round-up”. Ferrari, forgetting Bernie, Concorde, whatever, are most likely going to have to miss the Australian GP — the province of Modena, which includes Maranello, is under a travel lock-down according to the Italian Prime Minister: “There will be no movement in or out of these areas, or within them, unless for proven work-related reasons, emergencies or health reasons.” [quoting the BBC]
      Is Ferrari (geo-politically, not motor sport) important enough to use “work-related” excuses? And does Australia want to defy the Italian government? If Ferrari does go to Australia, will they be allowed to return to Italy? How will F1/Liberty count WC and WDC points? (I thought I read somewhere that GPs affected by health lock-downs will not count, but cannot find the reference.)
      This is a sad, but significant situation for F1 fanatics.

      1. @paul-a Yes, if any entity’s going to be able to use “work-related” reasons to move in and out of their home quarantine zone (other than medical organisations), it will be Ferrari – it’s a huge deal in Italy. If anything, I’d have said Pirelli is in bigger trouble here – it doesn’t have quite the same geopolitical clout, and every single team is dependent on its products to race.

  2. That’s the dumbest quote of the day in a while. If it was so easy to start a new series, it would have been done many times over in the last 40 years — since the original Concorde agreement. If “the 7” aren’t happy about the payout they get from Liberty now, do you really think they’ll want to invest their $$$ in a new series and accept smaller audiences, no TV contract, circuits that risk the wrath of the FIA. It’s ridiculous to think so. If Honda, Mercedes and Renault walked away, it doesn’t really matter that much. All of them have left in the past and will do so again, as soon as it suits them. As long as Ferrari is there, so are the majority of the fans.

    1. @ Gabe

      As long as Ferrari is there, so are the majority of the fans.

      First of all I agree that it is not likely that the 7 will walk to start another series, but one or more may still walk for other reasons.
      But your last sentence is wrong I think, F1 would not be able to continue with just Ferrari, Haas and Sauber.

    2. Firstly thanks Keith, for my first ever comment of the day.

      Gabe,

      if the “magnificent 7” walk away just the notion of a break away series will cause F1 problems. Without the 7, there is no F1 to market. A 6 car field is not going to sell to the audience or the circuit owners.

      Probably the same for a breakaway series.

      As I said, EVERYONE is codependent, including Ferrari. The sooner they get around a table and sort their differences, the better.

      You are also forgetting that Mercedes, Renault and McLaren don’t need F1 to sell their road cars. Participation in Indy Cars for McLaren opens up the North American market. Same for Mercedes in endurance racing plus GT3. McLaren operate in GT3 as well. Red Bull can sponsor just about any event to get promotional coverage for their drinks. Red Bull money spent in F1 can easily be allocated elsewhere and in any sport to keep the company profile high. Racing Point tie up with Aston Martin can easily change focus on GT3 and endurance racing. Maybe Racing Point can enter Indy cars to push the Aston Martin brand in the North American market. Maybe enter the Indy Car engine supplier market with an Aston Martin badged engine?

      Renault can ask themselves. Would we sell more road cars by participating in saloon car racing instead of F1?

      Most worrying for F1 is Haas, Will they continue in 2021 and if not, can F1 sell an eighteen car field to the public?

      1. Haas won’t continue past 2021. That’s why Kubica and Orlen didn’t sign for them and signed for Alfa. Gene Haas sounds like he has already given up on F1.

        1. I hope Haas do well this year and that Gene won’t throw in the towel, but I wouldn’t blame him if he did. I really hope Grosjean and Magnussen do “bring home the bacon” this season because if they don’t then I just can’t find any justification, love for F1 aside, why Gene should not to give up on the team.

      2. proud_asturian
        8th March 2020, 10:03

        Seething seven more like.
        They want Ferrari proprietary information and won’t get it.
        Stop being so delusional.

    3. Gabe, as others have pointed out, if Honda, Renault and Mercedes walk away together, then it doesn’t matter if Ferrari is there – they won’t have a series to compete in.

      Those other manufacturers can walk because they aren’t dependent on F1 in the same sense that Ferrari is – don’t forget that, with revenue from F1 making up a not insignificant amount of their turnover, Ferrari has to actively list the potential loss of revenue from F1 as a major financial risk item within their own financial statements.

      Take away those teams, and you also take away the vast bulk of the fans of the sport – Ferrari might be a popular team but, contrary to your beliefs, they do not make up the majority of the fan base, and I would be fairly confident in stating that at least some of who do say they are Ferrari fans would lose interest in what might be left of F1, shrinking what might be left of the fan base even further.

      That, of course, would be if there even was a viable series left, which is highly doubtful. If the grid shrank that far, then the sport would be violating its commercial rights deals with broadcasters, as there would no longer be enough teams on track. Similarly, they’d also be at risk of violating their agreements with the circuits that hold those races – between those two aspects, you’d remove almost all of the revenue streams that the sport has.

      At that point, competing in F1 doesn’t make any financial sense for any of those remaining outfits – Haas and Sauber are completely dependent on that revenue to fund their teams, and even Ferrari is fairly heavily dependent on those prize funds. What incentive would there be for those teams to continue?

    4. I have been a F1 fan since the 1989 season, when I was eleven.

      F1 would be much better without Ferrari. They cause more disruption and issues than any other team, and have a terribly arrogant “without Ferrari there is no F1” attitude.

      F1 has always been about those that Enzo Ferrari sneeringly referred to as “garagistas”, they’re the ones who innovate and keep the sport going.

    5. @Gabe Last time a split got threatened, it resulted in the teams getting what they wanted, because it dawned on the FIA that although the teams couldn’t organise a viable, credible international series without the FIA, neither could the FIA do so without those teams (the bidders it was able to attract, due to having several months’ more notice of the need, weren’t going to be enough).

  3. Couldnt agree more with Carey Chase.

  4. It’s not only Australia in Jeopardy. Lombardy’s quarantine is reported to extend until at least April 3 so Bahrain and Vietnam would also be affected.

    1. Given human testing for vaccine is only going to start in April and it could take next few months for mass production and vaccinations dont expect the situation to improve till late June.

      1. IIRC realistic timeline would be 20 months, at least to the point where its readily available to most people.

        However this crisis is taken very seriously by many countries and they are cooperating more so who knows, maybe we will get lucky and have it earlier.

      2. Unless the virus mutates in the meantime, then much longer.

    2. The thing is, if the mandatory quarantine is on, and that seems to be the case, it’s game over already. Either all staff has left Italy already or they won’t be. As I said before, only with special exceptions can the races go on normally. From what F1 said (Brawn) there can’t be championship raves if some teams cannot attend because of this (not their fault) so the first 3 GPs will not count.
      This assuming there are no other risks because Pirelli os also Italian, Alfa/Sauber has also some Italian staff and even FIA/F1 personnel are from there.

      And again this is with current hot-spot (Italy). People think that future dates should be OK but what if France, Germany or The Netherlands also become as serious as Italy and introduce their own restrictions?
      In 2020 the silly season will actually be during the races calendar…

      1. That would be my read on it too. Be interesting to get some comment from the Italian based teams and Pirelli as to whether or not their personnel have already left the area. If they haven’t I don’t see how Melbourne, Bahrain and Vietnam are going to be able to be staged as Championship races.

      2. @bakano FIA’s base is in Paris, and F1’s in London, so not all of them.

        1. @jerejj, yes, my phrase wording got wrong, I wanted to say some FIA and F1 personnel are also Italian and there might some impacted by this.

      3. @bakano The quarantine is definitely happening but apparently people will still be able to travel for work so it’s not necessarily game over just yet but it’s not looking good.

        It’s not only people being able to leave the area, or having left the area already, but being able to come back to their families and to their bases as well.

        1. @bakano The quarantine is definitely happening but apparently people will still be able to travel for work so it’s not necessarily game over just yet but it’s not looking good.

          @paulk yeah, they are apparently allowing for serious reasons, as the BBC writes it:

          Movement in and out of Lombardy and 14 other central and northern provinces is prohibited. People will be allowed in and out for serious reasons, including work reasons, upon the authorisation of local authorities.

          I love F1 but would hardly consider it a “serious reason”, but maybe they are allowed out (if tested before)…

      4. From what F1 said (Brawn) there can’t be championship raves if some teams cannot attend because of this (not their fault) so the first 3 GPs will not count.

        You see, I disagree with this. Just because some teams cannot make it, why should the others be penalised? This is the same logic as was used for the US Grand Prix where all but 3 teams could not race: that was outside the teams control, but the race went on anyway.

        I seriously doubt the teams themselves will be stopped, though. They’ll take their staff, pay to have them tested as a high priority, and quarantine them to stop them catching it. The governments will give them special dispensation.

        The race is more likely to be called off due to travel restrictions stopping fans from making it to the circuit, IMHO.

        1. @drmouse if the number of teams which cannot participate reaches a critical number, then the sport might start to fall foul of the requirements they have for a minimum number of entrants per race for their media broadcasting agreements.

          That particular US Grand Prix did see the teams technically enter the race, in as much as they did officially take to the grid, only to then withdraw their cars on the formation lap (hence being listed as “did not start”). That did not stop there being fairly lengthy and convoluted repercussions to that race, but part of the reason it went ahead was because those teams technically took to the grid, allowing the race to be initiated.

          As others have noted, in this particular situation, there is also the key issue of whether the current restrictions could impact Pirelli, given their headquarters are in Milan and the Lombardy region is one of the more heavily impacted regions in Italy. If that were to be implemented, it would have a far wider impact on all teams – in that case, the loss of a few teams might in itself be only part of a wider problem.

          It could also be noted that Ferrari’s customer teams, whilst not based in those affected areas themselves, could be impacted if they relied on support staff from Ferrari for their engines which could not be provided due to travel restrictions.

          If you had, say, Ferrari and Alpha Tauri unable to participate due to staff having travel restrictions, whilst Haas and Alfa Romeo were adversely impacted if support staff from Ferrari couldn’t participate, that would impact 40% of the grid – that’s a fairly significant chunk of the grid you’ve just lost.

  5. Speaking selfishly, I’m glad I got to a few GPs over the past two years, the this year looks like it might be a bust. I was looking forward to dropping some more cash on tickets, hotels, trackside vendors, etc. It’s going to be a hard year for anyone in anything tourism or event related.

    1. Glad you were able to enjoy your experience. Hopefully things will get better next year so you can go to more. :)

      And maybe 2021 stuff will be something new and fun too (hopefully).

  6. Not magnificent seven, but rather grubby political seven. Mercedes can get out of this sport, that would be good riddence. They have made the sport worse by pushing the current dumb hybrid era, they got a head start on everyone and as a manufacturer have too much say in the sport. I am glad Ferrari have veto power.

    1. Er it was Renault that pushed for the hybrid PU’s – they just happened to be really bad at producing them whereas Mercedes did a great job.

      What is grubby and political about demanding that a secret agreement on the legality of a PU be explained properly. If anything the settlement between the FIA and Ferrari has the hallmarks of grubby and political.

      1. If anything the settlement between the FIA and Ferrari has the hallmarks of grubby and political.

        Completely agree. A secret agreement over an investigation into whether one of the top teams was breaking the rules sounds… That does not sound clean.

        Imagine if a court said “we were investigating this guy for murder, but we cannot release any of the details or say if they did murder anyone because we signed an agreement with him”.

    2. kpcart, as has repeatedly been explained previously, it was Renault that pushed for the current hybrid power units.

      There have been journalists who have published extracts from the technical document that Renault submitted in 2007 that show how that document formed the core of the current regulation package.

      That said, the final form of the current regulations was negotiated in a series of public forums with all interested parties involved – part of the reason that we first found out that Honda was interested in returning to F1 was because they were an active participant in those negotiations over the regulations.

      Furthermore, we know that Renault were the first team to start running single cylinder tests as a proof of concept of the proposed regulation package. They were undertaking those tests at least four months ahead of any other team – it was, in fact, a point of contention amongst the teams because it gave Renault an initial head start.

      Basically, your claims run into the problem that the known timeline of events puts Renault as having pushed for the development of the current regulation package and being the first to actually commence development on the current regulation package.

    3. I suspect the sole reason for the Token System was to give Ferrari a head start over all the other engine manufacturers and to keep it that way. Fortunately Mercedes had already developed a concept engine about 7 years earlier, and they were able to incorporate that technology into their … I think it was the 2014 engine, which gave them a head start over their competitors. Note that Renault were the ones that wanted the (more or less) current hybrid technology format, this wasn’t something that started at Mercedes.

    4. ….and Ferrari has NEVER used a veto to support an engine type they prefer right?

  7. The coronavirus could be the kick up the backside F1 needs, to get away from the capitalist money making and make it a sport again. When the manufacturer’s start losing money, they can gladly leave, maybe a proper spending cap can then be put in place, not one that apeases manufacturers, and proper race teams might come back to F1. Maybe F1 can then go to better race tracks instead of the tilke monopoly.

  8. Even ‘greater’ than the infamous Ferrari-Mclaren spying scandal?

  9. The hybrid era is great because it shows that F1 at least plays lip service to environmental issues. Note: All public busses in Paris are hybrids except those that go up the hill to Montmarte which are all electric.
    I knew stupid people don’t realise there is an environmental crises on planet earth but those with brains, who believe in science like skilled engineers, know there is.
    Please no idiotic Trump-et replies. I don’t want to waste time reading self serving lies from climate change deniers.
    Jim – from bushfire and then flooding Australia. It has already changed here.

  10. That Porsche crash at Zandvoort looks absolutely ridiculously dangerous. Driver Huub can Eijndhoven is okay.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEkYBFO_TMg

    They’re going to have to change those barriers before F1 or any other championships race there.

    1. I was thinking to myself that the track isn’t safe enough for F1 when I was watching Verstappen’s test run the other day.

      Little run off, barriers very close, lot of curved twisty ‘straights’. It’s not just an issue of making a mistake but a mechanical failure having devastating consequences.

    2. Looking at the photos…..the other side of the track has the poles, but no catch fencing on it…..so it (I assume??) would be fitted for the F1’s….and probably it is needed on the other side as well, where the porchse crashed…..going to be a interesting race…

      1. There are still barriers coming from the States. and this accident was because the green car was launched by a other car over the barriers so this could happen on ANY circuit.

    3. I don’t get that the FIA would never entertain F1 being run on Indycar tracks like Road America or Laguna Seca, yet they allow it on this track!.

      It looks completely inadequate and the equivalent of running an F1 race at Oulton Park or Brands Hatch!

  11. Ferrari being absent from Melbourne won’t stop the GP going ahead unless the reason is Australia’s fault, and Perrelli’s tyres should have been shipped long ago

  12. To call Eindhoven a city is a bit of an exaggeration…

    I mean sure, it formally is a city. However, it very much feels like a slightly larger town in an otherwise rural part of the country. Nothing about the place is particularly historic, characteristic or modern. They talk weird (to my ears at least) and suffer from a massive minority complex. Suddenly trying to get a formula E race just as F1 is coming to the west rather typical in that sense.

  13. I’m told that “crapping” as used by Chase Carey has a different meaning in the US than it does in our British English…

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