I read in an article in F1 Racing (Feb'04) Mario Theissin was quoted as saying :As for cutting costs, Seriously, the solution is NOT on testing. It is on other things, and everyone knows it.
"Only this year has the focus changed to limiting costs and in my view this is correct. We have to contain costs and that is something we are spending a long time thinking about. In my view limiting the number of engines is one way to proceed, but unfortunatly this in not as successful as I'd hoped. Of course, you need fewer engines, but the R&D becomes more expensive. We've spent less, but nota lot less than we spent before.
The best way to cut costs is to limit testing. We are now testing for four times the mileage of what we race each year - about 50,000KLMS. If you limit the testin that would certainly reduse costs. But it would be very difficult to define an engine formula that really leads to cheap engines. It's not a question of the engine type and how expensive it is. If we changed the formula we would have to design and develop two parrallel engine concepts to cover the period up until the new formula starts. So intially, every change will increase costs in a very significant way."
I tend to agree with him. Any thoughts, any one ?