FIA and FOTA in No Agreement Shocker

Shock news from the Monaco Grand Prix.

Formula 1′s problems have not been resolved by a four hour meeting on a yacht.

This incredible non-development in the ongoing saga didn’t happen yesterday afternoon, following two meetings of F1′s decision makers.

In all seriousness, F1′s problems at present are so deep seated that they were never going to be resolved in the space of one afternoon and two meetings. The FIA will not budge over its plans for a budget cap, nor its intention to rigorously check the teams’ accounts next season. FOTA, on the other hand, will not budge over their insistence for a heightening of the budget cap, the dropping of the two-tier 2010 technical regulations nor the requirement of the FIA to check their accounts.

Interestingly, all these three points fall almost into insignificance when one takes into account potentially the most telling line from FOTA President Luca di Montezemolo yesterday, when he declared that all the teams were united in their insistence in a change of governance at the FIA.

That’s a huge statement, because it isn’t just aimed at questioning the way in which the regulations have been changed, it is essentially calling on Max Mosley, as President of the FIA, to stand aside. By saying that FOTA will not be happy until the method of governance has changed, they are leaving a very clear decision.

Either Max goes, or they go.

It’s therefore no shock that FOTA and the FIA failed to find an agreement yesterday. And in the current political climate, it looks unlikely that any agreement will be forthcoming in the short term.

Two immovable political objects have met head on.

Ferrari not very ‘appy

So Ferrari’s had its court case against the 2010 regulation changes thrown out, and the good folk at Maranello are not very happy.

Following a report on autosport.com in which a number of prospective new-for-2010 F1 teams was unveiled, Ferrari’s frustration has boiled over… resulting in a news piece on their official website that has got everybody in the F1 media centre here in Monaco giggling like school kids.

(For maximum effect, read the following in an Italian accent)

“They couldn’t almost believe their eyes, the men at women working at Ferrari, when they read the papers this morning and found the names of the teams, declaring that they have the intention to race in Formula 1 in the next year. Looking at the list, which leaked yesterday from Paris, you can’t find a very famous name, one of those one has to spend 400 Euros per person for a place on the grandstand at a GP (plus the expenses for the journey and the stay..). Wirth Research, Lola, USF1, Epsilon Euskadi, RML, Formtech, Campos, iSport: these are the names of the teams, which should compete in the two-tier Formula 1 wanted by Mosley. Can a World Championship with teams like them – with due respect – can have the same value as today’s Formula 1, where Ferrari, the big car manufacturers and teams, who created the history of this sport, compete? Wouldn’t it be more appropriate to call it Formula GP3?” Link

Toys… pram… thrown.

Wonderful stuff.

F1 Politics and Henry Kissinger

“There cannot be a crisis next week. My schedule is full.”
Henry Kissinger – New York Times Magazine – 1 June 1969

For the rights or wrongs with which Henry Kissinger’s role in International Politics will come to be viewed by history, he certainly came out with some great quotes… and ones which, this week, relate all too closely to the power plays afoot in Formula 1.

The sport sits just a week before its most famous and glamorous race, with not one but two crisis talks being held today. The first, this morning, is between the members of FOTA as they discuss their stance on the 2010 budget cap and two-tier F1 of the future. Later on this afternoon, FOTA President Luca di Montezemolo, whose Ferrari team has threatened to quit F1 along with Toyota, the two Red Bull teams and Renault, was due to meet with FIA President Max Mosley and F1 Commercial Rights Holder Bernie Ecclestone*. As far as the latter two are concerned, Formula 1 simply cannot have a crisis next week. As Kissinger so beautifully stated 40 years ago, their diaries are pretty tied up.

A crisis at Monaco is just what the FIA and Bernie don’t need. As the most watched race of the year, it remains, however, the best possible canvas for FOTA to paint their political landscape.

That political landscape is in flux. The teams at the centre of the controversy have made this battle about much more than budget caps and two-tier systems of technical regulations. Perhaps sensing an opportunity for change, the teams who have threatened to pull out of the sport now seek a clearer and fairer system of governance. With a new Concorde Agreement a long way from being agreed, they are using their political weight to readdress the political balance in the sport.

“History has so far shown us only two roads to international stability: domination and equilibrium.”
Henry Kissinger – The Times – 12 March 1991

Formula 1 has existed for almost 30 years, since the end of the FISA/FOCA war, with the domination of the FIA and Commercial Rights Holder over the teams. It was a fair deal… the organisers created a unified and strong championship and sold it to the highest bidders, while in return mechanics and engineers became wealthy men… some of them millionaires.

Times have changed however, and the percentages at play are no longer viewed as fair by those who argue they make the sport what it is – ie, the teams.

And yet, even amongst the teams there is the threat of a split between those who can conceivably pull down to the budget cap and those who can’t. Perhaps this morning’s meeting then is about much more than simply maintaining the unity of FOTA and the unity of the teams who are against or for the budget cap. Perhaps it is about rallying all of the teams to the same cause, that for the first time in almost 30 years there exists a very real possibility for the teams to make big changes to the way the sport is run.

The budget cap and two tier system of F1 is no longer the bigger picture. It’s about politics and who runs what and how. It’s about replacing dominance with equilibrium.

Neither side will want to budge however. Neither side will be willing to give an inch. The powers that have ruled F1 for 30 years will not want to see their authority nor their slice of the commercial cake reduced. At the same time however, the teams are aware now of just how much power they hold.

Neither will be willing to give that up.

For, as Kissinger stated in 1971, “Power is the great aphrodisiac.”

* Di Montezemolo will not attend today’s meetings following the death of his father. His place will be taken by Ferrari Team Principal Stefano Domenicali.

Vive la Revolution

The fallout over the FIA’s plans to introduce a £40 million budget cap in 2010 continues unabated today as Renault has become the latest team to announce its intentions to pull out of Formula 1 at the end of 2009, joining Toyota, Red Bull, Toro Rosso and Ferrari in its disillusion with the 2010 regulations.

But this is all just politicking, right? There’s no real danger that F1 2010 could be run without Renault, without Toyota… without Ferrari?

Those who assume so are quite wrong.

These are troubled times for the world of motorsport, and for the automotive world as a whole. Financial belts are being tightened the world over and Formula 1 can no longer continue at the levels of expenditure to which it has grown accustomed. So why has the notion of a budget cap caused such unrest? Part of the problem lies in the “two-tier” system of competition that the FIA has decided upon for 2010. But the greatest problem of all is the emergence of FOTA as a powerful force in F1 politics.

As far as the FIA is concerned, the tail is now wagging the dog and it is time that the normal order was restored. But just as the FIA moves to take its position of power back from the teams, so the teams themselves can now see the power that they hold as a united body. With both parties emboldened to stand their ground, we are facing a civil war between two factions who each know the power they hold and where neither one of them will be willing to show the slightest sign of weakness, nor give an inch in any potential negotiation.

Formula 1 last underwent a revolution back in the early 1980s, again a time of financial and political upheaval. The FISA/FOCA war as it was called almost 30 years ago gave us the system of governance we have today. It gave us a constitution, of sorts, under the Concorde Agreement. It gave us Max Mosley and Bernie Ecclestone as the power brokers and ultimate rulers of the sport.

Formula 1 today faces new dilemas and new issues, and the old Concorde Agreement is in dire need of rewriting. But as the FIA, Commercial Rights Holder and the teams stand their ground, there is no sign of a new constitution being written. Under increasing pressure from their boards, the car manufacturers have had to ask themselves if the sport is giving them fair reward for their services, and if they should stay involved. Over the past few days, Formula 1 has received its answer.

With just two weeks to go until the deadline for entries to the 2010 championship, Formula 1 finds itself at an impasse.

If the FIA buckles to the demands of the manufacturers, then the governing body of the sport will lose any semblance of authority.

If the manufacturers buckle, the FIA will be empowered to force through any regulation changes it sees fit in the future.

Thus the battle lines have been drawn. While FOTA President Luca di Montezemolo is set to meet FIA President Max Mosley next week, the result of the meeting will not resolve every issue that currently stands between the warring bodies. 

The threat of division in Formula 1 is very real indeed.

The FIA may have opened up three new spots on the 2010 F1 grid, but as things stand now, it has to face the very real possibility that it may struggle to fill even the ten that exist today.