In the round-up: The European Union will investigate whether Liberty Media’s attempt to add the Moto GP world motorcycling championship to its portfolio of companies including Formula One Management is a violation of market competition rules, according to a report.
In brief
Liberty faces EU investigation – report
Bloomberg claims the EU will examine whether Liberty Media should be allowed to own both major series. Former FOM owner CVC Capital Partners had to sell Moto GP when it took over F1 in 2006 to comply with the EU’s wishes.
Liberty Media announced in April it planned to buy 86% of the Moto GP business for €3.5bn (£3bn). The report claimed the EU will begin a “phase two probe” of the deal within the coming week.
F1 must pay for permanent stewards – Ben Sulayem
Some drivers including Max Verstappen have called for the FIA to use the same stewards at all 24 rounds of the world championship. A rotating panel of stewards currently appears at different races.
Ben Sulayem said he is willing to introduce the change but pointed out the series will have to pay for it. “Ultimately, it’s the FIA’s responsibility; this seems like a matter for the FIA and the FOM to work out,” he told The God Flores.
“So if the FOM writes a cheque to the FIA, but the scope of the agreement says ‘part-time stewards,’ and F1 wants something different, then that’s a different matter, and it comes with a new price tag.”
“That means that F1 – i.e., the teams – should pay for it. So if this is what we’ve signed up for and we want to change it, then I believe we need to pay for it.”
Duerksen fastest at Yas Marina
Joshua Duerksen was comfortably quickest in the second day of Formula 2’s test at the Yas Marina circuit, setting a best time of 1’35.583 which put him three tenths of a second ahead of Richard Verschoor.John Bennett ended the day at the bottom of the times after causing two stoppages. He brought out the red flag within the first quarter of an hour by spinning at turn two, then came to a stop again later at turn three. The test will conclude today.
Bottas sells hair for charity
Valtteri Bottas raised £4,000 for Movember by selling a special card featuring a piece of his race suit and a lock of his hair. “I want to thank all those who bid for a piece of my mullet and supported this crucial cause in the name of men’s health,” he said.
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Links
Motorsport boss 'saddened' by proposed FIA changes (BBC)
'Schmerold added that this was the second time in six months that he had expressed concerns about planned changes to the statutes that appear to affect accountability and governance.'
Wehrlein eyes Le Mans 'big goal' (FE Notebook)
'When asked if he could race in 2025 Wehrlein was coy but did say 'let’s see how it fits. My main priority is Formula E and always will be.''
Liberty Media appoints Chase Carey to board of directors (Financial Times)
'Liberty Media Corporation today announced the appointment of Chase Carey to the board of directors of Liberty Media (the 'board') effective January 1, 2025. Mr Carey most recently served as chairman of Formula 1 from 2016 to 2022 and as its chief executive officer from 2017 to 2021. He will serve on the executive committee of the Liberty Media board.'
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Notable posts from X (formerly Twitter), TikTok and more:
Sergio Perez has delivered 2,000 bottles of tequila to Red Bull team members at their Milton Keynes base.
#F1
— RaceFans (@racefansdotnet.bsky.social) 12 December 2024 at 22:54
he made us do it like 5-6 times 😭😭 kept yelling at us to not smile too it was so funny pic.twitter.com/BuTb8Wpr81
— ella 🌠 (@rottenellas) December 12, 2024
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Comment of the day
The latest revisions to the 2026 F1 car regulations look good to some:
It looks far, far better than the initial concepts for the 2022 car. I like the hints of ’07/’08 but am worried that it’ll still be a bit heavy.
Doobnew
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday to David N and Siddharth!
grat
13th December 2024, 4:25
Exactly how much money does the FIA collect from teams for entry fees each year?
Where is that money going, and why isn’t it being spent to maintain a full-time steward rotation?
Avro Anson (@avroanson)
13th December 2024, 6:35
$25,787,663 (See https://www.racefans.net/2024/12/11/mclarens-entry-fee-doubles-to-6-1-million-due-to-constructors-title-win/ )
MBS said that how FIA spend their money is nobody else’s business. So it’s none of your business! How much longer will this petty dictator be allowed to tarnish the reputation of motorsports?
notagrumpyfan
13th December 2024, 7:45
Plus a similar amount in Super License fees!
And now they are trying to match that amount a third time by penalising swearing and other minor offences.
There is a good indication though where the money is going; those support letters for Ben from all over the world won’t come for free.
MichaelN
13th December 2024, 9:03
He didn’t say that, though. He said he’s not accountable to a bunch of complaining F1 millionaires. Which is true. The FIA administration is, however, accountable to the member organisations. And although it may displease some, investing in smaller clubs is one of the pillars of Ben Sulayem’s platform that focuses on empowering developing regions.
Besides, Ben Sulayem is not in charge of motorsport affairs. That’s a good old English lad.
notagrumpyfan
13th December 2024, 9:32
He is though!
FIA is responsible to organise the F1 World Championship; good stewarding is an important part of that.
The wealth of the participants is irrelevant.
Weird that you seem to think that FIA can collect millions from teams and drivers, but yet has not responsibility, let alone accountability, towards them.
(or maybe not that weird given your previous posts and apparent blind adoration of MBS)
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
13th December 2024, 17:51
If the FIA President was actually accountable to the member organisations, the rule requiring the FIA President to approve all ethics committee investigations would never even have crossed the voting table, let alone voted through.
SteveR (@stever)
14th December 2024, 0:03
Isn’t the FIA a non-profit operating under French law? Seems it would have to report to and be audited by France to maintain its non-profit status. All this seems a bit fishy.
SPArtacus
14th December 2024, 5:06
Careful, Avro, MBS will disappear you.
Anyway, I would love permanent stewards.
MichaelN
13th December 2024, 8:56
It’s not practical to have full time stewards. The season is very long, and unlike the participamts they don’t have a role in anything other than judging the live events. It’s also tradition to have one steward from the host nation, so there’s inevitably going to be 25ish one-time stewards.
But, the others are actually pretty common. I did the round-up earlier in the season, and there’s a couple of stewards who are at most events. There’ll naturally be seen as a leader of sorts. The “we need all the same stewards all the time” complaint isn’t as big as deal as is sometimes suggested.
pcxmac (@pcxmac)
13th December 2024, 9:43
you are right, drivers should be able to sue the FIA if they make a bad call, and say cost someone a championship, or let someone get away with almost-murder.
anon
13th December 2024, 13:17
Is it really as impractical as you claim? FIM, the motorcycling equivalent of the FIA, does have some permanent stewards for MotoGP racing, despite having a race calendar that regularly runs to 20 or more races per season.
Considering that FIM has fewer resources than the FIA, yet has racing series with comparable global commitments, how come they are able to manage with the resources they have, but the FIA cannot?
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
13th December 2024, 17:48
A permanent steward was tried in F1 for two seasons (2007-2008). Bias increased, and it contributed to the bad feeling among the F1 paddock that contributed to Max Mosley losing the FOTA-FIA war and being forced to decline seeking the FIA Presidency in 2009.
I see no reason that it would work any better in F1 a second time around.
(FIM, in its defence, has far fewer series under its command, and delegates responsibility for road motorbikes to the FIA. The FIA Safe and Affordable Helmet Programme is a motorbike safety scheme run by the FIA, not FIM. From the FIA’s perspective, part of F1’s role is to help pay for all that. It is concerning that its budget is apparently so tight that paying for 4-8 full-time staff is apparently beyond its ability or willingness to fund).
anon
14th December 2024, 0:33
@alianora-la-canta I think many would argue that the problem wasn’t really with the permanent steward role itself in that case, but rather the political wrangling and factionalism that was occurring at the time.
When Tony Scott-Andrew took on the role in 2006, he was generally regarded well initially, but the FIA did take action several times in incidents that actively undermined his role and his independence. For example, Scott Andrews and Whiting were asked to judge the legality of Renault’s mass damper system in Hockenheim that year, where they declared that the system was legal and in compliance with the FIA’s regulations – only for the FIA to immediately appeal against Scott-Andrews’s decision and then eventually forced a ban on mass dampers by using rather roundabout logical reasoning that allowed them to bypass the stewards.
Asides from that, you had the somewhat bizarre situation where the FIA was later publicly contradicting Scott-Andrews by claiming that he had made a statement about a particular decision to Whiting, only for Scott-Andrews to then publicly state that the FIA was lying and that they’d fabricated the entire story. The problems there weren’t really to do with whether there were temporary or permanent stewards, but rather the factionalism within the sport and within the FIA.
On another note, doesn’t the fact that the FIA was previously capable of fielding permanent stewards within Formula 1 kind of undermine the cost argument? Why would it be the case that they could afford permanent stewards in the past, but not now? Until now, the FIA always argued against employing permanent stewards for Formula 1 on other grounds, with Sulayem being the first person to say that cost was a problem (and, even then, he rejected calls for permanent stewards on different grounds in the past, with this being the first time he’s said that it was too expensive).
The FIA does also seem to have the funds to be able to employ some permanent stewards for some of the other racing series that it administers – the FIA has sometimes even loaned some of those permanent stewards from other series to help out with Formula 1 races.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
13th December 2024, 17:50
Having some stewards at large numbers of F1 races is itself a problem, because of the bias issue.
SPArtacus
14th December 2024, 5:08
It doesn’t need to be the same crew for all 24 races. But two crews that do 12 rounds or three that do 8 rounds would be great and very doable.
Diez Cilindros (@diezcilindros)
13th December 2024, 6:31
Re COTD, 2007 cars weren’t particularly racy, lots of dirty air. I can recall a figure I read in F1 Racing, speaking about 25 % downforce lost behind other cars.
I’ve got the feeling the cars are going to lose a lot of performance on the PU side and they need to compensage by adding more downforce than expected. More accurately, losing less downforce than expected.
I feel the philosophy behind these rules was “ok, the main goal is to get the 50:50 PU balance, the chassis and aero aren’t the main goal and their purpose won’t be produce better races, but to compensate the loss of performance on the PU without erasing the progress made in 2022”. I think it’s a very delicate compromise, and I don’t want to be pessimistic, but I feel the override solution won’t be as effective overtake-wise as DRS and it sounds quite dangerous (speed differentials) to me.
Jere (@jerejj)
13th December 2024, 6:44
RaceFans Bluesky post: So he’s bribing Red Bull to avoid getting his contract terminated.
Those main grandstand spectators on the Las Vegas GP weekend acted well for the purpose.
Re COTD: I’d still like to know where that initial 40-50 kg reduction target went, given the 50-50 ICE/electric power ratio has been in place the whole time & more or less all other features as well, especially those that’ll automatically reduce overall weight.
PacificPR (@streydt)
13th December 2024, 13:09
What a ridiculous suggestion that the FOM should pay the stewards. Wouldn’t it be a much better idea if the FIA would train and hire some well qualified John Does – instead of hiring ex-drivers that come with a hefty price tag and a bias (or frustrations from missed opportunities). I mean name one ex-soccer pro that became a referee.
Crawliin-from-the-wreckage- Special Unhinged Edition (@davedai)
13th December 2024, 14:26
Matthieu Remmerie was a steward at the most recent Qatar F1 GP.
A brief bio extract
MATHIEU REMMERIE
F2 & F3 STEWARD, FORMULA E STEWARD, MEMBER OF THE RACB
NATIONAL SPORT & APPEAL COURT
Mathieu Remmerie began his professional career as the Sporting and
Administration Manager at the Royal Automobile Club of Belgium. He represented
the Belgian ASN in several FIA sporting commissions and has been a National
Steward in Belgium since 2014. His international experience began shortly after
this, officiating in Formula 2, Formula 3 and
Formula E. He is a alumnus of the new
Global Pathway for FIA Stewards, one of the first members of the programme to
graduate through to Formula 1.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
13th December 2024, 17:42
@streydt They’d have to be allowed to exercise their best judgment first, and that at minimum would require some sort of regulation reorganisation in directions the current FIA President does not like.
JoshJ81
13th December 2024, 17:23
I see Checo has finally delivered on the season.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
13th December 2024, 17:41
For those people asking whether the FIA President’s approval being required to pursue ethics committee complaints would lead to abuses of power…
Attempting to demand the commercial rights holder pay for something the FIA is contractually required to resource, simply because the type of contract is proposed to change (especially given the proposed change will make it easier for bias to creep in, whether it is intended or not), seems a bit suspicious.
pcxmac (@pcxmac)
13th December 2024, 20:47
if you have ever worked with people who don’t go by the book, and prefer a substantial amount of ‘grey’ area to work in, usually it’s because it allows them the ability to work politically/under the table. Boundaries are good, especially when it comes to things like justice, following the rules and safety. So why the FIA wants to keep things as they are, and only have stewards that are following the ‘current trend’ or political attitude rather than following the letter of the law tells us all we need to know.
The FIA is a political institution, who uses it’s “dealings” with track owners (control venues and events) and the status quo (current rules and regulations) to milk the entertainment industry/corporate inputs in to ‘sports’ like F1. They are no different than FIFA, or whomever. It’s not like teams and drivers can stop paying them, there is no where else to drive, they can’t form other racing leagues because then they would be sued or blackballed like the golf thing that was going against the PGA. Its a racket, just like war and government.
S
14th December 2024, 11:23
That’s a very anti-FIA way to put it.
The FIA provide (unpaid and rotational) stewards to every F1 event under existing FIA regulations and are fine with the current arrangement.
If F1/FOM/Liberty want to change that arrangement to a single ongoing panel of paid stewards, then I see absolutely nothing wrong with them funding that change.
It the logical next step, after Liberty funded the development of the 2021 technical regs…
Essentially, this is just MBS reiterating that F1 is the property of the FIA, not Liberty Media or the teams. If they want a piece of it, then they have to pay for it – and it no doubt comes with many strings attached.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
13th December 2024, 22:01
About the part where perez delivered all those bottles to the team members: that’s the minimum he could do!
isthatglock21
14th December 2024, 16:41
Ah yes…I’m sure the Redbull employees who just lost a £3k-£25k+ bonus for not winning the constructors, which all comes down to Perez are ecstatic at being thrown a £120 bottle of Tequila! I’m sure you can trade that bottle for a new kitchen, ya kids private school fees or trade it for £20k into your ISA savings. Thank you Mr Perez. Embarrassing. I’m amazed he had the balls to show up.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
15th December 2024, 0:02
Ahaha, I like the part where you thank mr perez!