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Archive: 2009 May

The budget crap — another FIA political ploy

8 May 2009 01:03

Categories: History, Opinion

The other big news to come from the FIA last week was its proposal for an optional budget cap limiting teams to a budget of £40 million excluding costs of drivers, engines, hospitality, marketing and fines (because that’s the FIA’s money, duh!). I don’t particularly have a problem with a budget cap in theory.

Cutting costs has been the biggest issue in Formula 1 for years, and not just from the FIA’s perspective either. Beforehand, though, the approach was to institute ever more barmy technical restrictions which, it can be argued, have adversely affected the racing. All the while, teams still spent the same amount of money simply trimming off weight and having their CFD systems create increasingly alien aerodynamic tricks.

Ideally, I would think that F1 teams should be free to raise however much money they like and spend it as they see fit. But just now it is clear that this is an untenable situation. So we must make a choice. As an F1 fan, given a choice between strange technical restrictions (18,000 RPM limit on the engine? Why? To prevent faster cars catching slower cars?) and a budget cap, I would opt for the budget cap any time. F1 is, after all, supposed to showcase the best technology. F1 teams can still do this with a limited budget so long as they have the freedom to innovate.

But it is the FIA’s motives behind the budget cap that concern me. Alongside the budget cap comes a raft of other proposals that hint towards a complete U-turn in FIA policy towards new teams.

For the best part of a decade-and-a-half, the FIA have made it difficult for new teams to enter F1. The main form this took was in the entry bond. Following the Mastercard Lola debacle of 1997. Under pressure from the title sponsors, the Lola car was rushed out a year earlier than originally intended. It went to Albert Park having done almost zero testing. The cars were a dozen seconds slower than pole position during qualifying. Before round two in Brazil, Lola went bust.

After that, new teams had to pay a $48 million entry bond in order to demonstrate that they were financially stable. That is why the trend has been for new teams to buy old teams rather than start from scratch (which only Toyota and Super Aguri did while the bond had to be paid). The entry bond was dropped a couple of years ago in recognition of the dwindling grid.

Now the FIA seems determined to welcome back smaller private teams, having spent the past decade driving them out, keen to avoid another Lola. Now, they will welcome any new interest with open arms — including Lola! There is also apparent interest from Prodrive / Aston Martin, not to forget USF1 which launched earlier this year.

A number of GP2 teams are also bound to be eyeing an entry to F1. iSport have dropped a heavy hint, while ART, Campos and Racing Engineering are also said to be interested. In March, Joe Saward believed that five new teams were in the pipeline. That number will have surely increased since then.

It is unusual because there probably haven’t been so many teams seriously considering entering F1 since the early 1990s. And it is not as though the small grid is a new problem. For several years there has been space on the grid for 24 cars. F1 has not seen more than 22 cars enter a race since 1995 (excluding the ill-fated Lola in 1997 for one race). Indeed, for four of the last seven seasons there have been only 20 cars on the grid.

Not only have the FIA introduced budget cap proposals in order to attract new teams, but FOM have agreed to actively make it easier for new teams to enter. This will come in the form of free chassis transportation and free air travel for employees. Plus, far from having to pay a $48 million entry bond, new teams will now be paid $10 million per year to enter! I’ll buy two please!

All of this is on top of the plan to increase the maximum number of cars that will be allowed to enter the championship. The grid could now potentially increase in size from 20 cars this year to 26 cars next year, the first time in recent years the FIA have countenanced such an idea.

Why does the FIA have a sudden interest in swelling the size of the grid? Could it possibly have something to do with that pesky Fota organisation that is giving the FIA a bit of well-deserved heat just now?

All ten Formula 1 teams are presenting a united front at the moment. Despite their considerable differences, the ten teams have just about managed to put them aside in order to stand up to the FIA and Bernie Ecclestone, who find it difficult to credibly counter such unanimity among the teams.

It is difficult enough for the ten teams to remain so friendly with each other. It would be awfully helpful if the FIA could make it eleven, twelve, thirteen teams that have to get on with each other. To make those extra new teams be teams that are on the same page as the FIA — as the new teams naturally would be — that would be a stroke of genius. All of a sudden, Fota would not be quite so credible.

The new teams are joining specifically because of the new budget cap, and they will be happy enough to plug an FIA-supplied Cosworth engine into their cars. They will be happy to acquiesce to the FIA’s mad plans for years to come.

Most fans like to see larger grids, and many of us love to watch a small team take on the big guns. But Fota is the best chance there is for the future of Formula 1 to be mapped out in a way that is fan-friendly.

The budget cap may ostensibly be a way of securing the future of Formula 1. But the new teams could be the biggest threat to the chance of actually improving it.

4 comments

The FIA, McLaren and Ron Dennis

7 May 2009 05:29

Categories: Opinion

For a change, the FIA handed out a sensible punishment. I think for what McLaren did, to be banned from any races would have been too much. At the same time, a three race suspended ban reflects the fact that McLaren really should not get caught doing this sort of thing again. I called for the FIA to deal with the situation in a fair manner, and I think they have done so. For once, the FIA made a sensible decision!

Where it starts to stink, though, is in the FIA’s justification for why the punishment was not too lenient. James Allen, among many others, noted how the departure of Ron Dennis appears to have paved the way for this relatively light sentence.

FIA president Max Mosley saw no need to labour the point on this matter and said he was satisfied that a real and lasting change had been made at McLaren with the departure of Dennis and the appointment of a new chairman, a captain of industry, Richard Lapthorne.

Mosley said, “In the end there were decisions taken by the people who are no longer involved. That being the case, it would have been unfair to go on with the matter.

“We think it’s entirely fair. They’ve demonstrated there’s a complete culture change and under those circumstances it’s better to put the whole thing behind us.

“Unless they do something similar, that’s the end of the matter.”

Mosley suggested that the decision to lie to the stewards in Melbourne and to continue the deceit in Malaysia was down to sporting director Dave Ryan and implied that the FIA felt Dennis had been involved. Although Whitmarsh told journalists in Malaysia that no-one more senior than Ryan had been involved in the matter and Dennis strenously denied that his decision to move away from the race team had anything to do with the case, the implication in Mosley’s words is that he feels he was involved.

This kind of sums up the relationship the FIA appears to have with McLaren and Ron Dennis. Even though there is no real evidence that Ron Dennis was remotely involved in the decision of Dave Ryan and Lewis Hamilton to lie to the stewards, Mosley had a hunch, and that’s enough apparently. But with Ron Dennis gone, there’s no need to “labour the point” any more, so there is no ONE HUNDRED MEELION DOLLARS fine this time round.

If you ask me, there is far more of a sense that Martin Whitmarsh knew more about this issue than he let on. And how Ron Dennis could have been so heavily involved is beyond me. He wasn’t even present at Sepang, so how on earth could he have manipulated the situation as it unfolded there?

As for a culture change, don’t get me started. It’s bad enough that the FIA have managed to delude themselves that they can somehow tell how much money all the teams will be spending from next year onwards. But now they are also apparently auditors of culture too! Do they have spies within McLaren keeping track of the culture all the time? And how the hell does a culture change so “completely” within one month anyway?

As if you needed further proof that the FIA were basically on a Ron Dennis witch-hunt for the past several years, Max Mosley added these choice words:

Martin Whitmarsh made a very good impression. He’s straightforward and wants to work with us. We’re all trying to do the same thing, which is make the championship successful. Martin fully understands that and we reacted accordingly.

In other words, Martin Whitmarsh is more likely to accede to the FIA’s bully-boy tactics, while Ron Dennis was more willing to stand up to the FIA. And I have to say that Ron Dennis seemed much more closely aligned to the fans than Max Mosley ever does. A bit of the sport died when Ron Dennis left. But the FIA are now rubbing their hands with glee.

I only hope that Fota turns out to have the will power to stand up to the FIA for the good of the sport. In the meantime, the FIA will do everything in their power to break the partnership down. They scored a major victory by finally getting rid of Ron Dennis.

This is no way to run a sport. When is Max Mosley going to be put up before the WMSC for bringing the sport into disrepute? Because he has brought it into disrepute a thousand times more than Ron Dennis ever did.

4 comments

Normal service will resume soon

6 May 2009 18:16

Categories: Admin

It’s been a while since I have blogged here. Sorry about that. A lot happened last week, and I plan to cover the most important things, starting tomorrow with the McLaren punishment.

In the meantime, though, it feels inappropriate to publish what I have written in light of the sad news about Max Mosley’s son, Alexander. As readers will know, I am not always the greatest fan of Max Mosley, but this is just a terrible thing to happen. My condolences to the Mosley family.

0 comments

Congratulations to Dumbarton FC

4 May 2009 22:18

Categories: Current affairs, Fife, General, Personal, Scotland, Sport

I’m not a terribly big football fan. I used to be interested, but I went right off it early this decade. My theory is that this is down to the fact that the football team I was brought up to support is Dumbarton FC. Despite having been born in Kirkcaldy and lived here almost all my life, since my father is from Dumbarton that is who I was encouraged to support. My dad is a big Dumbarton supporter. That is why his blog, and indeed his book, are called A Son of the Rock.

But despite my dad’s fanaticism, I don’t think supporting Dumbarton was conducive to me becoming a football fan. It’s not easy to support a football team that is based at the opposite end of the country, especially when that team is — to be fair — crap.

There was also the experience of having sat for ages in what must be some of Scotland’s grubbiest football grounds. Most of my matches must have taken place at Dumbarton’s former home of Boghead Park. By the time it was vacated in 2000, it had been Dumbarton’s home ground for 121 years. At the time, it was the longest any senior football club had occupied a ground. It was a shitehole. Nice views though, which I enjoyed from the pitch on the invasion following the last-ever game played there.

I’ve been to Cowdenbeath’s ground a few too many times for my liking too. I once utterly lost the will to live, freezing my bollocks off standing at the railings there. Worst of all though was East Fife’s ground, Bayview Stadium. This place has one stand. This stand sits in the shade. It also directly faces the North Sea. I don’t think I have ever been so cold in my life.

This weekend, I decided on a whim to travel through with my dad to watch Dumbarton play. It must have been my first football match for six or seven years. It was possible for them to win the Division 3 Championship. I thought it would be interesting to watch Dumbarton achieve something, though I have since learned that I apparently watched Dumbarton get promoted before, and I have absolutely no recollection of it.

Saturday’s experience was a reminder of just how far away Dumbarton is. We left the house at 12:30pm, and didn’t return until the back of 8pm. And all we did was watch a football match.

The football wasn’t the sort of standard that would convert me back. Dumbarton were too dominant. Elgin City, bottom of the table, had nothing to play for and they certainly looked like a squad sapped of motivation.

Dumbarton ended up winning 6-0, breaking a couple of records in the process. Derek Carcary put four of them away, becoming the first Dumbarton player to do so since the 1970s. Dumbarton also surpassed their all-time record of not letting any goals in, currently standing at almost 700 minutes.

I watched Dumbarton become Division 3 champions in all but name. The fans and players celebrated, but there was no trophy presentation. East Stirlingshire, just three points behind, still technically have a chance of winning. But with a goal difference, er, difference of 18, it is almost 100% certain that they will not. I felt it was a slightly surreal and empty way for Dumbarton to become champions. Nonetheless, champions they apparently are. It makes them the first team in Scotland to become Champions at four different levels!

Funnily enough, I was almost roped in to watching my local team Raith Rovers last week. In the end it didn’t happen. But congratulations to them as well. This weekend they became Division 2 champions. I didn’t see any dancing in the streets.

6 comments

Scotweb2 two

1 May 2009 18:10

Categories: Edinburgh, Internet, Scotland, Technology

For those interested in web 2.0 in Scotland, there will be a second Scotweb2 event this June. Among those attending: digital content marketing firm w00tonomy, Alistair Tibbett from Greener Leith, Iain Henderson from Mydex, Pezholio, Jadu and Learning Pool.

The event will take place on 19 June at the Melting Pot on Rose Street in Edinburgh. For more details and to sign up, click here.

As always, keep an eye on the Scotweb2 blog for all the latest information.