Forumla One 2009

[Mike]

I think that Ferrari budget is about $100 - $200 million a year. . . Honda spent about $250 million a year to get the Brawn team to where they are today!

[Mike]

Update on the Donnington Park Circuit for 2010 British Grand Prix it looks like they are having some financial difficulties at the moment as the financing bank has pulled out of the deal. Hopefully in the next two weeks they will agree new funding and get on with their 9 month construction programme.

Good luck Donnington. If you have 9 months to construct and you think it will take 9 months then you will be late. No time contingency is a very bad thing.

[John Knight]

I'm not too sure Ferrarri has really thought through its argument in opposition to the Budget cap...

This extract from a BBC article shows exactly what I mean..

"Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo, who heads the Formula 1 Teams Association (Fota), wrote to Mosley last week to express concerns about the cost cap which he said could lead to a two-tier F1." He also went on to say it was unfair.

WTF??

So what have we got now? Ferrari with a budget in excess of £150m complaining that its unfair that its not going to be able to spend 4x as much as the other teams. Back in the 90's when ferrrari won was it 7 consecutive world constructor titles (which I am sure were not cheap) with schumacher they weren't worried about a two tier sport then were they?

As for F1's ability to survive without the whinging bloody italian arseholes..

F1 without the Red scum would be like football, or a general ellection without the red scum. The vast majority of people would only be sad to see them go because there would be no-one left to really hate.

[Mike]

5 teams are threatening to withdraw from the 2010 championship if the $40 million cap is brought in! Ferrari, Renault, Toyota, Red Bull Racing and Torro Rosso obviosly think that their wealth makes them deserve to win more.

It surprises me that Toyota and Torro Rosso and Red Bull have massive budgets. They are traditionally rubbish teams. Only Red Bull Racing is getting any better!

[Mike]

FIA remain firm on the $40million budget cap and do not want to encorage a two tier championship (funny really since that alread exists!).

Lola are considering returning to the sport if the budget cap is retained. I don't know who Lola are but I would welcome another team to the Paddock. Hopefully the big boys won't throw their dummy out the pram or keep this rediculous rules lawyering going. It is rather cynical to actually sue the FIA everytime you disagree with a rule change.

[Mike]

Fota teams Brawn GP, Ferrari, McLaren, Renault, Toyota, BMW Sauber, Red Bull Racing and Toro Rosso take drastic action and threaten to set up a rival Formula 1 championship if the budget cap is not dropped. This is amazing, I am especially amazed that Brawn are included on that list.

BBC must be bricking it after paying for the F1 commercial rights for the next few years! We could see a much reduced field in the 2010 championship.

[mr_e]

Damn, that is some serious posturing. I agree with one of the quotes in the article saying it's no way financially viable to have two F1 events. The teams concerned are obviously really, really keen on seeing the spending cap dropped, to the extent they'd jeopardise next season's racing.

[Mike]

It appears to be a fight between Ecclestone and the F1 teams over the amount of cash they receive from selling the rights to the sport. They only get $500 million at the moment of the assumed $1bn revenue. The teams want more and the budget cap would reduce the weight of their argument with Ecclestone.

[Mike]

Button 6th on the grid as Vettel manages to gain Pole ahead of Brawn's Rubens Barrichello. This is his worst qualifying this season but not a total disaster, it just makes winning at the home circuit more difficult. I am quite looking forward to the race tomorrow.

[Mike]

This Guardian article highlights the root of all the F1 arguments in one very succinct sentence.

Once Mosley has gone, he continued, they will expect Ecclestone to respond to a list of grievances including the refusal to grant them a bigger slice of Formula One's gross income, the insistence on charging such high fees to circuit promoters that ticket prices are unnecessarily inflated, and the failure to establish rounds of the championship in North America, an important market for the major manufacturers.

Even more succinctly this argument is about MONEY! Wikipedia claims that the F1 commercial rights holding company made £447 million of Pre-Tax Proffit last year which is probably causing part of the upset (especially since they managed to do this on only $750 million of turnover).

Button only managed to gain 6th place in the race at Silverstone which is disappointing not to do well in front of a home crowd, although, it is usually the way.

[BarcelonAl]

Button only managed to gain 6th place in the race at Silverstone which is disappointing not to do well in front of a home crowd, although, it is usually the way.

To be honest, sixth was a pretty good result considering his car's performance. This seemed to be mainly to do with not being able to get his tyre's up to the critical temperature. He did improve in the last stint on soft's, coming right up behind the 4th and 5th placed cars.

The important thing is that he scored points...it's a race, not a sprint.

Hamilton's car appears to be woeful...16th place for the reigning World Champion!

[Mike]

The Mclaren is a doomed championship car, I hope they are devoting all their attention to developing the new car for 2010. This must be the point that they give up on this years championship. At least it is a humbling experience for Lewis, hopefully they will improve the package for next year.

[Mike]

Max Mosley appears to have stepped down as head of the FIA. Details are sketchy at the moment but F1 championship may now have a future in 2010. . . we shall have to see.

[Mike]

Barrichello has a fit and accuses his team (Brawn) of forcing him to loose the race. I don't know how he thinks this is the case with the 11th fastest car on the track but he obviously has a bit of an issue about being perceived as second fiddle after the Ferrari / Schumacher years. He also threatened to walk out on Brawn if they start favouring drivers. Interesting!

Good race from Mark Webber who claims his first GP race win. His reaction after winning on the team radio says it all. I was quite touched by that scream for joy, good going Mark!

[BarcelonAl]

The fact that Webber had to do a drive through penalty as well shows how good a race he had. Seems like a nice guy and after 130 races, deserved his first win. I don't think many of the teams he'd raced for previously were classed as particularly competitive so it shows that now he is in a good car that he is a decent prospect for the driver's battle.

Barichello has thrown his toys out of the pram without actually speaking to his team. He got held up because the fuel system wasn't functioning properly...that's not favouring any particualar driver as they both use the same system so it could've broken at anytime. He's just cheesed off because Button got out of the pits in front of him and had the balls to stay competitive even when his tyres were on their way out in the last few laps!