Haas

I find Williams more inspirational that Haas. Mick should have been placed at Alfa with Kimi and Gio to the wreck Haas is.

 

The transportation budget is greater than $7M per year. The Engine costs are greater than $7M per year.

Anyway, this is down from roughtly $300M for the top 3 teams plus another $100M that does not show up on the books.

So your proposal is 1/30th what they are currently spending.............maybe we could have radio controlled 1/10th scale F1 racing at that budget.

 

Some beggar, others bugger.

 

It is simple...the money goes into an escrow account at the beginning of the year. All expenses must be paid from that account. If something shows up and there is no proof it was paid for from that escrow account, it is cheating and the team is suspended for the entire rest of the season and forfeits the money in the account. I think this would quickly prove very effective.

 

No...you'd have much simpler racing cars. But if you would be happier, we could double the amount. And, as I posted above, all monies would go into an escrow account in the name of the team. All bills would have to be paid from that account. ALL bills. If something shows up and it can't be proven to be paid for from that account, the team would be disqualified for the rest of the season, and forfeit all money remaining in the account. And if they run out of money before the end of the season, they aren't allowed to race and they could forfeit their points for the year.

 

You want to transform F1 into a punishment. Who would benefit from it?

Suppose, with your theory, that 4 teams run out of money 2 races before the end, which isn't impossible with a rigid budget.

So 8 cars wouldn't participate in the last 2 GPs, when circuit fees have been paid, tickets already sold, etc ...

You would end up in a total fiasco, like it did at Indy years ago...the public wouldn't wear it.

If on top you don't pay those teams, some would go out of business. Do you want to kill F1 ?

Do you think before you write ?

 

https://www.planetf1.com/news/david-coulthard-mick-schumacher/

David Coulthard believes Mick Schumacher needs to stamp his authority on Haas team-mate Nikita Mazepin in the quest to secure a future Ferrari drive.

Formula 2 rivals Schumacher and Mazepin will form an all-rookie pairing at Haas in 2021 after the team decided on a complete change of driver policy, ousting Romain Grosjean and Kevin Magnussen who had both been with them for four years.

Schumacher, son of Michael, the seven-time former World Champion, is a member of the Ferrari Academy and the natural progression would be for him to eventually race for the team with which his father dominated F1 in the first five years of this century.

But the 21-year-old German has acquired a reputation as something of a slow starter in the junior categories before ultimately showing his quality – and Coulthard thinks that in F1, he may not have quite so much time on his side.


“I’ve seen him progress from lower formulas. He is a focused, fit and hungry racing driver,” the Scot told The Express.

“He has his own personality but he has put himself at the front of championships with all of the support and opportunity that has been put in front of him.

“You know the classic thing about a horse to water…you can give someone a great car or a great team but if they don’t have the skill, they won’t do anything with it.

“Haas will be a safe place for him to learn. I don’t think he will struggle in beating Mazepin – if he does then he has a problem.

“If he doesn’t, then that’s exactly what I expect. In doing so, in a couple of years he could earn the opportunity to be with either Ferrari or another team.

“It all depends on Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz.”

Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto believes it may take some time for Schumacher to start showing his true potential with Haas.

“I think it will be very difficult for him at the start,” said Binotto. “If I look at his past experience in both F2 and F3, normally he is delivering his best in the second season and not the first.

“I think Mick, the way he has developed himself, is learning a lot in the first season and becomes very strong in the second half of the second season. That’s why I think two seasons will be important for him.

“But already in the second, I’m expecting to see progress compared to the first one.”

 

I don't see making F1 affordable to more, smaller, indie teams as punishment. And fans would benefit from more exciting races
because there would be a greater variety of cars. Indy suffers from being a spec series. I am proposing exactly the opposite.
The disease that has poisoned F1 are the insane rules meant to lower costs but that have only increased them. If some teams are
so poorly managed that they run out of money, then open the grid to any new team that wants to fill the spot by qualifying. The
badly run teams will fold, and new blood will enter the circus.

I don't want to kill F1...it is doing that to itself. I want to bring back an F1 that can spawn a new Colin Chapman...I want to see
an F1 where there is room for change and surprises at every race, where engines and aero aren't frozen with rules, and car designs
get back to the basics of motorsport, and where drivers can be equally as important at the cars.

 

Your proposals are completely unrealistic.
You propose to punish financially some teams and prevent them from racing: "And if they run out of money before the end of the season, they aren't allowed to race and they could forfeit their points for the year."
Like many business, some teams run on credit, and live on tomorrow's money. Your system wouldn't allow that !

Also, I don't see any need to make F1 more affordable. It's F1, for Christ's sake, the pinacle of motor racing, not an amateurs series!!
Let the teams spend as much as they want like any other business, and let the cream come on top!
This obsession with parity, level playing field and budget restriction is completely stupid.
F1 needs more freedom to be attractive to the public, not less.

My reference to Indy wasn't about that series, but the US GP held at Indianapolis with only 6 cars.

 

Naaahhhh....1/12th. I've already got some ol' Associated chassis to start with from '82-'84).
(edit: and one Delta a competitor friend gave me to try; I stuck with Associated))

Better yet, 1/24th slots. I've still got some old scratch built formula (inline motor) and sidewinder sportcar chassis and bodies (from my '66-'69 racin' days) to start with.......even a wing car I dabbled with at a couple of short lived shops in '87.

 

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Goodness william. What did you eat last night???

You sound too much like me today.....

 

If you are happy with the way F1 has evolved, be my guest. I sense that most of the F1 fans here would like to see it devolve back to days when it was cars and drivers racing each other, when it was run by men who had the sport in their blood, and not by mega corporations and media conglomerates inflating the costs and writing it all off as marketing. If by "pinacle" you mean today's ticket prices and costs of running an event, I agree. But that isn't "motor racing." When I think of the "pinacle of motor racing" I think of when the costs were less and the racing was better. I think Alonzo's demonstration laps in his championship Renault makes the point perfectly. Today's cars are just smart phones and vacuum cleaners, one step away from being Formula E.

 

I follow F1 since the 60s. It has changed tremendously, and we cannot put the clock back.
It's not Formula Nostalgia, but contemporary F1 that follows technology and economic changes.
Everything in life now is high tech and big budgets; F1 simply follows that trend.

 

I build my first anglewinder in 1967 using 1/16 piano wire and 1/16 brass sheet and kep using versions of that design until the track closed in 1971.

I did RC racing in 1/10 scale from 1985 through 1990.

 

A nice idea but completely unrealistic. It's impossible to police such budget caps.

The only way to successfully minimize how much money is spend is to a) simplify the aero and b) simply the engines.

Aero: The 2022 rules are a good start. I'd limit the floor more and narrower front wings and take even more elements out of the wings.

Engines: The hybrid engine is far from cheap. I'll refrain from getting into too much detail but a 3.5 liter V10 rev capped and build in the same way to the V8 era
regulations is the most cost effective and entertaining form for F1 racing.

With limited aero and engines close in power there really isn't too much of a performance advantage to be had, so even if a team poured unreasonable amount of money into their aero department they wouldn't end up with a car that would be drastically faster.

On top of that I don't see any point in having a driver salary cap. For what? Let them earn as much as they possibly can. In fact with the above rules in place the driver would be making the difference for once.

 

If a driver is already on the maximum salary, how can another team attract him if they are not allowed to offer more money?

 

They can't, unless it's for emotional reasons (i.e. a love for a particular team), a driver wouldn't really have much inclination to move.

 

It's unrealistic to cap salaries.

That takes away a major incentive, and distorts the drivers market.

 

with (tweaked) 2022 rules, especially with a simpler engine, F1 would quite quickly become sustainable and a more approachable sport for teams. I'm quite sure a top team can be ran for ~50 or so million (excluding driver salaries). I also think it would be much more entertaining, thus more likely to attract sponsors. Losing a sponsor wouldn't mean the team is that much closer to death, instead, they can practically shrug it off. It could well be a sustainable business for teams that could generate a good rate of return.

 

From this, it looks like Ferrari/Alfa dictate drivers, though not sure why they insist on keeping Kimi employed:

https://www.france24.news/en/2020/12/formula-1-vasseur-not-sure-sauber-will-extend-with-ferrari.html

https://www.autoweek.com/racing/formula-1/a34606813/alfa-romeo-f1-team-has-more-eyes-on-2022-than-a-closer-ferrari-alignment/

Also, from what Vasseur is saying, seems that after the Alfa sponsorship deal (and associated Ferrari engine supply) runs out, they’ll be looking at PU supply options besides Ferrari. As they are staffed and self-sufficient in design and engineering already, they can easily do this, where Haas can’t.

This all seems to indicate that Ferrari placed a higher importance on protecting their staff or soon-to-be-former staff (affected by budget cuts) by arranging the hiring of the latter by Haas or subbing them out into the Haas organization. So no link to Ferrari, except if paid by them, and so acceptable to FIA and F1 as can be assumed. Placing Mick at Haas seems to confirm that Ferrari have chosen Haas as their preferred partner because they also can secure the employment of their ex-design staff.

I would expect Merc will be doing similarly, maybe subbing out staff to tRP or even Williams.

 

Ten teams, ten bank accounts in escrow. If the money doesn't come from these accounts, it isn't allowed. That is very easy to audit and manage. No other restrictions on engines, car designs, tires, etc. Sounds like a better formula than what we have today. Of course that would put a lot of FIA dead weight out of work, replaced with just ten CPAs.

 

I still think we'll see the big teams cheating, quite easily. ''oh yeah we got this entire engine developed for just €1000'', as they invoice their subsidiary...

 

You simply can't enforce a budget cap with teams that come from different countries.
They will use different currencies, have under different tax systems; overheads and labour costs will also be different, etc ...
How can you harmonise costs with teams operating from Italy, Switzerland, France, Britain and the USA, but some with German and Austrian owners? Possibly Canadian too.
Also teams use subcontractors, and receive some sponsorship in kind; policing all this will be a nightmare, IMO.

 

Hey, for once we agree on something!

As I said, it is impossible to police a global corporation when it comes to its finances.

 

Controlling the ten escrow accounts is easy. So what?

Money can come from any direction and go any direction. Materials and resources can be booked under different titles, descriptions even companies and show up or do work behind the scenes. The chances to game such a system are endless.