F1 will burst like subprime bubble

[szlaszlo84]

I think that Toyota's exit from F1 was long decided. To car manufacturers F1 gave the chance to show that they are capable of developing better technologies than others. Since Toyota considers Honda to be its biggest rival it was an obvious decision by Toyota to quit it. They only stuck around for an extra season to see the car's potential as it must have been already developed at the time of Honda's announcement.

I also think that a lot of you guys are suggesting that F1 should move towards an even more spec series strategy for cost cutting, but it'd kill all of what F1 is about. Making engines equal after they have been developed is the bigges mistake I've seen in a while. It kills the whole nature of F1. Teams had a lot of free hand in the development from the 60s to the 90s - until F1 started to be run like a circus - so it is a lie that costs are limiting. It is just that we limited our development so much that it doesn't allow for innovative thinking anymore. When it does... take the case of the current season. You end up with smart teams beating money teams. You will see that was always the story of the winners in F1.

[bazanaius]

Personally i think that there sould be a limit on the resource base that a F1 team can have. Teams of 700-800 people shouldnt be allowed. A team should be able to operate with arround 400 people tops, taking Force India and STR as the prime examples, ill also include what is now the Brawn team post Honda. I propose this for F1 teams resources:

* One single wind tunnel per team, not the current trend of 2 or 3 per team.
* Limit on the CFD power. (Im not so well up on this area so would require guidance on this one)
* Impose a limit on the the design teams, make it that they design team of a car can only be limited to 20 "acredited" people in the team. Get the bigger design departments sich as Ferarri & McLaren to work with the same that the smaller guys work with.
* A limit on the ammount of chassis produced, as BMW Sauber, Toyota and a couple of others have produced up to 10+ a year since at a cost of £600,000+ per tub. A limit of say 4 would surfice, Renault, Force India and Red Bull can do it like that, STR and Brawn did it with 3 this year.
* Standard telemetry systems, with open and free usage. Also with this, limit the ammount of data engineers at tracks to 10 per car and no more than 10 per team back at base.
* A FIA approved parts base, meaning there is a short list of parts that can be used on certain areas of the car, such as Brakes and certain suspension parts.
* A single or maximum of three control tyre compound(s) that are road relevant. Limiting ammount of mechanical grip you can get from them to 50% of current levels.
* Free up some of the engine development ban areas, but dyno test a single engine from all manufacturers at the start of each season and allow adjustment of RPM and Torque curve accordingly to the most powerful.
* If the FIA want greener cars, limit each car to 200KG of fuel for the weekend, also along with the lifting of engine ban areas, produce engines that can go long distances on that fuel.
* Free up the areo regs to somewhere between the 2008 and 2009 specs, but encourage designers to have a clean, or clener airflow out the back of it. With this a minimum ride height of the car will be enforced to allow underfloor aero.
* Specify that all cars need to start off at least (or a maximum of) 850kg (or equivelent weight) and have pre race weight checks. Post race cars should be scruteenered, not weight checked. This should allow bigger drivers to compete with smaller ones weight wise.
* Transfer windows, make it that a team cant change a driver till a mid season point, or 2 specified races, say round 6 and round 12. Also teach team, if a Massa incedent happens has to have a specified young driver in GP2 or a other lower formula to take place of the injured driver, A specified test driver that has had race experience in F1 in the past 2 years will also be allowed. (Get the teams to have a young driver programme)
* Have "Monday" tests for teams at 4 GPs in the european season and one out side Europe for young drivers and test drivers to get into the car and get up to speed with it. Id say make the rounds to be Barcelona, Turkey, Hungary, Monza & Bahrain. They are at the tracks, so it wont cost the teams too much more for an extra day there in a test facility.


Give the teams a few inches, but with that the FIA should come to aggreement with the teams for some sort of budget cap or something to the same extent.

You are way off on some of your numbers... There are no teams that run more than 1 tunnel atm. Even if they do they will be limited to a certain number of fan hours a week, and CFD is limited in terflops per week. Numbers of chassis used is also much lower than what you quote.

[pgj]

I am not holding Max up as a paragon of virtue, in any sense of the word, because he is not. Max was responsible for fuelling the investment war that is still being waged in F1 and is still taking casualties. However, Max did at least see the error of his ways even if he would not admit his role in starting the war off in the first place. Until FOTA, or another trade organisation, has a reality check with an administration that will sit down with the FIA and formulate a blue print for F1's future F1 is always going to be under a cloud. A blue print is essential if F1 is to attract new investment. Investors need to be able to see what benefits can be derived from F1 and at what cost.

In the meantime F1 needs a period of stability that will allow the dust to settle. It does not need the kind of toys out of the pram tantrum that we have had from FOTA's President today. A charge of bringing FOTA into disrepute seems to be appropriate here.

FI's bubble has already burst. The only question is how many more casualties will it take before someone has the wherewithal to repair the leak.

[ESPImperium]

You are way off on some of your numbers... There are no teams that run more than 1 tunnel atm. Even if they do they will be limited to a certain number of fan hours a week, and CFD is limited in terflops per week. Numbers of chassis used is also much lower than what you quote.

I did say that i would need some guidance on numbers. As for wind tunnels, some guidance would help, but it may be contray to what i have read in many interviews. As for chassis, i have the figures on those for how many is made, and im pretty shure about the cost of a tub as thats what i think thats what Ian Philips said about the VJM/02 tubs cost during FP coverage in Malaysia when they were talking about Vettel writing off his Kate (RB5-02) in Australia.

But again, i would like to add to my defence, that some of the numbers may need amended with some advice.

[WhiteBlue]

Investors need to be able to see what benefits can be derived from F1 and at what cost.

I was getting the impression that they always had that need and that teams and FOM were pretty good to communicate those basic facts. I do not see a reason why this will change with regards to sponsors looking for exposure or car manufacturers or drink manufacturers like Red Bull. With prices radically falling the supply and demand will adjust at a lower level and business will continue as it has done for more than 50 years before.

[ISLAMATRON]

Max was responsible for fuelling the investment war that is still being waged in F1 and is still taking casualties.

How is Max responsible for the irrisponsible spending of the teams?

Please give some concrete examples.

Max has only ever been for the lowering of costs, and the improvement of spanking... err I mean safety.

[Pup]

What Max was responsible for was required spending due to the incessant reg changes. Any team can piddle around the back of the field with a fraction of the budgets of the big teams, provided they're happy doing it and can find sponsors. But if the governing body tells you that you have to scrap your car every year and develop something completely different, then you've got to have the money.

I wouldn't call any of the spending by the manufacturers 'irresponsible', merely because I'm not in a position to make that call. I doubt anyone else here is either.

F1 has almost always been dominated by a few wealthy teams. They change from era to era, but there have always been the privileged ones. And if those guys want to spend millions competing with one another, and can justify the expense to themselves and their partners, then more power to them.

Toyota was a disaster from day one - not because of their budget, but because of their management style. People always use them as an example of the futility of big budgets, because they spent so much and gained so little. But Ferrari and Mercedes spent as much and gained greatly.

As I have said before, people concentrate on the cost, but the cost is irrelevant. What matters is the value. The FIA is the only organization I know of which actively campaigns to lower the value of its products. Their policy only makes sense in the kind of contorted logic that Max was drawn to.

Take Brawn as an example. The marketing value of their team was estimated in excess of $250 million, 13 races into the season. That would make it over $300 million now. As far as I know, that was about the budget of the top teams at the height of the budget battle a few years back. What did Brawn spend? $150 million at most? So we talk about these teams as if they sit in their factories and burn money for fun, but the reality is that there is a real value for what they spend, and they wouldn't be there if there wasn't.

And, guess what - right now the value isn't there. What the FIA should be doing right now is asking themselves what they can do to regain the value they lost. Instead, they'll spend their energy berating the manufacturers for not allowing them to devalue the series even more.

[WhiteBlue]

F1 Darwinists like Pup think that the big teams with huge financial muscle and endless resources should be allowed to do as it pleases them. Having a grid of five or six teams would not worry these people if the big teams can run more cars.

For the sport it makes more sense to regulate how much money can be used, to open the competition to new teams and protect them against the leading teams to have the rules all their way. For the traditional big teams like McLaren and Ferrari change is bad because it allows new teams with clever engineers to innovate and catch up.

The big teams are running multiple design teams and study everything to death in order to make incremental changes to competitive factors. Only they can afford those kind of programs. So a certain amount of change to move F1 towards better sustainability makes sense. If it has to be done against Ferrari and FOTA so be it. I'm interested to see how Todt will manage that conflict.

[Giblet]

The only team that seems to not care about money is Ferrari. Other teams look as though the don't care, like Mclaren, but I am sure that Ron would like to spend less. He needs to sell road cars to keep racing now. That $100 million clams of fine had to sting a bit.

I've said it before, but Ferrari race on the backs of misery, cancer, addiction, and death. I like to call them out for this, as it something that needs to change. As a reformed tobacco smoker, I feel that people that contribute to it's existence through action or inaction, when there is positive action that could be taken, are as low as RJR is.

IMO their Smoking American Cowboy sponsorship should be banned form the sport as soon as Ferrari's contract is up. Barcodes or not.

[nipo]

As I have said before, people concentrate on the cost, but the cost is irrelevant. What matters is the value. The FIA is the only organization I know of which actively campaigns to lower the value of its products. Their policy only makes sense in the kind of contorted logic that Max was drawn to.

=D>

Very well said!

Spec series and budget caps make no sense to me. It is a CREATED belief that cost-capping and reducing the areas where teams can innovate will mean a more sustainable future for F1. As many here has pointed out, these measures are taking value out of F1 instead.

IMO rules should be applied around the racing and sporting aspects, not on budgeting. If FIA wants to do something about the money, they should look at ASSISTANCE e.g. line up loans / re-distribute FOM money etc. Again, it is a CREATED belief that money issues can only be solved by limiting the output, rather than also finding new input.

That said, not everything Max has done is evil. At least he did quite a good job at safety. And speaking about safety, that's one area where rules still need to be stringent - loosening up the rules is much easier said than done.

[ISLAMATRON]

Cost is real, "value" is subjective... the BS marketing firm is selling a load of crap... The "value" of Brawn's "marketing" is exactly what they were paid for it(Virgin paid about 400K per race). If the value was any more than that the BS marketing firm(all of them are BS actually) sure did miss out on a huge commission. Instead of making up imaginary numbers they should have been lining up sponsors.

The Budget cap would have in no way "taken value out" of F1... that is just more marketing BS... 18 or less car grids is what would have taken value out of F1.

A billboard facing the highway holds the same marketing "value" regardless of what the person paid to advertise their product on it, the same number of eyes fall upon it. Same for F1, the winning car holds the same number of eyeballs regardless of how much it cost to be made/developed, anyone argueing any different is a liar, most probably a professional one, in the field of marketing.

[Michiba]

The Budget cap would have in no way "taken value out" of F1... that is just more marketing BS... 18 or less car grids is what would have taken value out of F1.

A billboard facing the highway holds the same marketing "value" regardless of what the person paid to advertise their product on it, the same number of eyes fall upon it. Same for F1, the winning car holds the same number of eyeballs regardless of how much it cost to be made/developed, anyone argueing any different is a liar, most probably a professional one, in the field of marketing.

Sure, a budget cap won't take value away from F1 (might even increase it due to greater parity in terms of technology). But if a team has the means to generate more value than the budget cap, they would feel entitled to use it.

I don't think a budget cap is some sort of panacea that will help the sport. If you can't afford to be in F1, then join a lower formula.

As others have pointed out, I think freer regulations would actually help the budget concious teams, where they would have more freedom to win via ingenuity, rather what we kinda see now, which is endless griding away towards very small gains.

[SCengineering]

Personally, I don't think it's necessarily the high costs that make current F1 unsustainable. With engine parity and aerodynamic development being pushed away from complexity there is no opportunity for F1 teams to showcase the cleverness and innovation that has characterized F1 engineering over the last 50 years or so. What isn't sustainable is having some castrated version of the sport masquerading around as the same F1 from years ago.

[nipo]

A billboard facing the highway holds the same marketing "value" regardless of what the person paid to advertise their product on it

I am okay about your argument on 18 cars etc. but this statement is just plain wrong.

[noname]

the winning car holds the same number of eyeballs regardless of how much it cost to be made/developed.

above statement is true as long as number of spectators willing to watch F1 is constant and that may not be the case if we would have grid filled with the cheap cars made of wood and silver tape.