2024 Cost Cap Breaches

[AR3-GP]

It’s just as possible that nothing did.

This is Formula 1.

[diffuser]

You're making things out to be more black and white than they really are. The budget cap seems to work on some kind of bartering system with shifting interpretations, as alluded to by Joe Saward. There was a delay because of this. Teams interpreted certain items in new ways this year. Otherwise there would be no reason for a 2 month delay if everyone just submitted the same formats and exemptions from last year.

So there should have been more transparency.

Furthermore, it's no longer in the financial interest of the sport to have any more breaches or scandals. F1 just signed a big deal with Apple. Lots of new American sponsors. Like Vasseur/Wheatley said, no team at this stage would do anything intentionally. Did some get creative? Probably. It feels like things got smoothed over through negotiations. Toto Wolff had nothing to say the entire time, but he was a singing canary in 2022. Weird that he (nor Zak Brown) no longer wanted to screech and defend Formula 1 from it's evil-doers...unless it was his team under scrutiny as has been well understood at this point...they got away with something, we just don't know what. FIA helped Ferrari cover up something a few years ago. They are capable of absolutely anything with enough money thrown about.

The thing is, this goes both ways. Of course, scandals are not in the best interest of the organization, but the real damage would mostly fall on whichever team is caught in violation rather than on the organization itself, which might also earn some praise for enforcing its rules. You also don’t want to establish yourself as an unfair or biased governing body. If that perception forms, newcomers and sponsors could easily walk away.

As for the interpretation aspect, that’s true in nearly every area of the sport. In simpler terms, Formula 1 is a game of who can exploit the rules most effectively. That said, clear and blatant breaches cannot be (and are not) ignored. The certification delay is being used as an excuse to claim foul play, but I don’t think that's reason enough. I also disagree with your view on Zak and Toto’s silence. When they did speak up in the past, there were genuine concerns that a team had breached the cost cap and escaped proper consequences. Given how Mercedes lost a championship in the final race of 2021 under controversial circumstances, it’s only natural that Toto would chase even the smallest sign of perceived unfairness from their POV. As for Zak, well, let's just say he was more of an "invested observer" at the time.

If nobody is speaking up this time, that likely means there’s nothing significant to discuss, and that applies across all teams. The situation last year was similar. We heard about Alpine’s procedural breaches, but nothing major from the top teams. This year, there’s a lot of speculation but no tangible evidence something fishy happened. People are creating narratives to explain the delay in certifications, but that’s all they are at the moment, stories. Everyone has a right to their opinion about how the FIA operates, but actual accusations need to be backed by proof.

The FIA did show some transparency: Aston Martin was cited for procedural breaches while the rest were cleared. If someone doesn’t trust that outcome, there are channels to challenge it, provided they bring evidence to the table. You can’t label everything as a cover-up simply because you think something might have happened. It’s just as possible that nothing did.

I agree whole heartedly. You could argue that a journalist would like more transparency (shiit to stir) cause it increases readership but in the end it only makes the sport look worse than it actually is by promoting a false positive. The Sport only looses in that case. I only want to hear about it when there are actual facts.

[AR3-GP]

I agree whole heartedly. You could argue that a journalist would like more transparency (shiit to stir) cause it increases readership but in the end it only makes the sport look worse than it actually is by promoting a false positive. The Sport only looses in that case. I only want to hear about it when there are actual facts.

Absolutely, wait for the facts from the FIA. That is why we didn't discover the Singapore 2008 scandal until it was too late...We let the FIA and 1 team decide what the facts were...Its also why Sulayem ran unopposed in the latest election. He decided what the facts were.

[diffuser]

I agree whole heartedly. You could argue that a journalist would like more transparency (shiit to stir) cause it increases readership but in the end it only makes the sport look worse than it actually is by promoting a false positive. The Sport only looses in that case. I only want to hear about it when there are actual facts.

Absolutely, wait for the facts from the FIA. That is why we didn't discover the Singapore 2008 scandal until it was too late...We let the FIA and 1 team decide what the facts were...Its also why Sulayem ran unopposed in the latest election. He decided what the facts were.

What would you have done with the 2008 Scandal with Piquet insisting he made a mistake? He only came forward cause Renault let him go on 3 August 2009, he was basically black mailing Renault to keep his seat. You need evidence or a witness to start court proceedings. Unfortunately, if a driver says he made a mistake, aka I stepped on the throttle a little to hard on that lap on that corner, how do you prove he is lieing? It happens to drivers all the time. Look at the torpedo! Oooof and Grosjean... Remember the year Grosjean took out Alonso @ SPA? That could have cost Alonso the championship in 2012, he lost by 3 points.


I'm not saying that all the teams don't see the truth, I'm saying we don't. It is the way of F1 that teams police each other. If RBR, Merc, etc look at something the FIA contested Aston Martin on and are in agreement with FIA's response from AM, then why should I care? Why do I need to know about it? It's only something that an MBA in accounting is gonna understand anyways.