Ferrari to take their toys and go home

[Sureboss]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsport/formula_one/8044860.stm

Ferrari have announced they will quit Formula 1 at the end of the season if the sport continues with plans to adopt a £40m budget cap from 2010.

"No F1 in 2010 if the rules do not change," read a statement. "Ferrari does not intend to register cars for the 2010 F1 world championship."

Ferrari fear the evolution of a two-tier championship, between those teams who adopt the cap and those who do not.

The teams will discuss the plans with FIA chief Max Mosley in the next week.

Mosley, who heads the sport's governing body, has previously insisted F1 could continue without Ferrari, saying: "The sport could survive without Ferrari. It would be very sad. It is the Italian national team."

F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone, meanwhile, dismissed claims Ferrari could quit F1 on Tuesday morning, telling the Times: "Ferrari are not stupid. They don't want to leave Formula 1 and we don't want to lose them, so we'll get to grips with it."

Ha! Now, this is funny. I don't see the FIA changing their minds on the budget, F1 has to cut costs to maintain it's future in the current climate.

 

[Ardius]

But are the two-tier regulations necessary? Most think not, it should really just be a forced budget cap, and if Ferrari don't want to take part, stuff them, the rediculous levels we are at now have to stop somewhere.

I think if these teams really want to put forward a good argument to not reduce budgets this much, they need to start showing why they need such rediculous amounts of money. But herein lies the point, they clearly are wasting money somewhere and are not willing to admit it - otherwise, why not reveal or explain where all the money goes?

 

[ASH32]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsport/formula_one/8044860.stm



Ha! Now, this is funny. I don't see the FIA changing their minds on the budget, F1 has to cut costs to maintain it's future in the current climate.

I knew this would happen, it won't just be Ferrari threating to quit aswell. While I have not got a source, I am sure I read somewhere that Toyota were considering quitting if the FIA continue with the budget cap. I agree with you though F1 does have to reduce costs someway and the FIA are very stubbon. I am not sure how F1 will survive without Ferrari and if it did it wouldn't be the same ( I don't even support Ferrari and even I feel like this ).
Lets hope common sense preveils and a solution is found that is good for the sport, pleases all teams and cuts costs. Do you think this will happen?

 

[Ardius]

I think if FOTA can continue to be united, then they stand a chance of getting it changed, but Williams, Force India and Brawn have said they are applying anyway....so the FIA already have the advantage of saying that "if these teams are willing, why not the rest?", if all the teams decided not to join, the FIA would surely have to back down? What would happen if no one applied for next year apart from a hand-full of new teams? Would they continue the championship regardless?
I think the FIA will relent but I still think Ferrari are being a tad silly complaining about spending less money. (though I agree it isn't entirely fair to have a two-tier system).

 

[Soundtrack]

Another FOTA vs FIA it seems. I read entries for 2010 end by the end of the month. Curious to see how flexible the parties will turn in the weeks to come.

 

[Tired Tyres]

The news on BBC news channel just now has said that Ferrari have said that they will quit the sport if the £40 million budget is confirmed.

edited after I failed the accountancy exam!

 

[Ardius]

I think more accurately, its the two tier system which is their main worry, although I imagine we will see them ask to push the budget up as well.

 

[Touring Mars]

The news on BBC news channel just now has said that Ferrari have said that they will quit the sport if the £40 budget is confirmed.

Hell, if there is a £40 budget, even GM could enter a team! (They may have to have me as a driver, but you gets what you pays for!)

 

[Tired Tyres]

What's the odd £39,999,960 got to do with it?

 

[Touring Mars]

Sorry for being so pedantic

The clock is certainly ticking, with the deadline for the 2010 sign up being only two weeks away - what I don't get is why Ferrari think this would lead to a two-tier system... why wouldn't everyone just stick to the budget and hence use the same regulations? It is quite revealing that Ferrari are saying this, because it basically means that they are admitting to the fact that they have stayed competitive simply because they were able to spend as much as they did... the idea of a level playing field clearly horrifies Ferrari (hence why they also objected to standard engines so vehemently). To be honest, I dislike the idea too, but unbridled spending surely has to stop somewhere, for the future good of the sport if nothing else...

Perhaps one solution would be to set the budget cap much higher at first and bring it down incrementally over the next 5 years?

 

[Ardius]

Perhaps one solution would be to set the budget cap much higher at first and bring it down incrementally over the next 5 years?

Thats what I think will happen in the end, and I think its what Max & Co originally wanted, once again bidding high, and making the teams agree lower.

 

[Earth]

Hopefully then Ferrari would enter the premier class of sports car racing.

Alot of good manufactures are throwing money into the wind to run midpack in F1 right now.

BMW, Toyota. They need to come back to Le Mans.

 

[Danny]

Le Mans is no-where near the scale of F1 in terms of media coverage. It's less attractive to the big-bucks sponsors that generate a large amount of the racing budget. The sponsors for F1 tend to be wealthier than those sponsoring the endurance series'.

 

[Ardius]

Alot of good manufactures are throwing money into the wind to run midpack in F1 right now.

Well, seeing as even Force India get more coverage than the Audi Le Mans effort, are we really surprised?

 

[Bram Turismo]

As much as I'd love to see Toyota returning to Le Mans with an all new closed cockpit car, it's never going to happen before the board has gotten their world title. To be honest though, I think the budget cut is far too drastic. Ferrari use what, a 250 million pounds a year? Try cutting that down to 40 million, you'll be having a serious headache how you're going to start your designing and whatnot. It's Formula 1, it's the highest you can reach in motorsport, and I think we should expect manufacturers using a lot of money on this kind of development. After all, they're designing the fastest racing cars in the world. No, I think a cut down to 120 million pounds would be suitable. It's still a bunch of mony, but it allows teams to get used to the difference in development more easily. Imagine all the people they'd have to fire to get the costs that low

 

[Ardius]

As much as I'd love to see Toyota returning to Le Mans with an all new closed cockpit car, it's never going to happen before the board has gotten their world title. To be honest though, I think the budget cut is far too drastic. Ferrari use what, a 250 million pounds a year? Try cutting that down to 40 million, you'll be having a serious headache how you're going to start your designing and whatnot. It's Formula 1, it's the highest you can reach in motorsport, and I think we should expect manufacturers using a lot of money on this kind of development. After all, they're designing the fastest racing cars in the world. No, I think a cut down to 120 million pounds would be suitable. It's still a bunch of mony, but it allows teams to get used to the difference in development more easily. Imagine all the people they'd have to fire to get the costs that low

But cut back 10 years ago or more and they were barely spending 10 million....the manufacturers coming in and spending millions is widely regarded as what killed off all the privateers, as it became nigh on impossible for them to compete.
F1 is expensive, yes, but it never needed to be this expensive and the era widely regarded as the best for racing featured almost solely privateer teams....

 

[blinky77]

I wonder what all the conspiracy theorists that have been ruining F1 for the past 9 years with their cries of "FIA-RARRI RACE FIXING CHEATING etc." have to say about Ferrari leaving...

Actually I'd be sad to see Ferrari go, but the final discussions have yet to happen, so I'm not going to go into Defcon 5 Panic mode.

 

[NapoleonMikey]

i think alot of you are forgetting the budget cap is optional. ferrari dont have to go with the budget cap but there car would be under the current restrictions while those that go with the budget cap would not. and i think that is whats leading to the two tier mentality by ferrari. your going to have teams like Ferrari McLaren and BMW all still dumping money into the sport while you have these new teams that are under the budget cap. the new teams are only spending 40M so it wouldnt be surprising if there cars would be unreliable to save money or just not up to par with those that are dumping the money into the sport. in which case now you just have moving road blocks on the course running a race against the other 40M teams while you got the super fast cars trying to run there race while avoiding the moving road blocks. itd be kinda like the le mans series with 2 classes running but at that speeds i don't think its a good idea.but then again it could be the opposite of the budget cap teams being alot fast with the aero regs and the non budget cap teams are slower. if that where the case then the FIA has a good argument for the budget cap.

 

[Mt. Lynx]

Le Mans is no-where near the scale of F1 in terms of media coverage. It's less attractive to the big-bucks sponsors that generate a large amount of the racing budget. The sponsors for F1 tend to be wealthier than those sponsoring the endurance series'.

Well, with Ferrari, BMW and Toyota in a fight for Le Mans victory, maybe at least the tifosi would come watch? And with the audience, the sponsors have to go where their customers are too. And with a bigger spectacle comes better TV-coverage.

i think alot of you are forgetting the budget cap is optional. ferrari dont have to go with the budget cap but there car would be under the current restrictions while those that go with the budget cap would not. and i think that is whats leading to the two tier mentality by ferrari. your going to have teams like Ferrari McLaren and BMW all still dumping money into the sport while you have these new teams that are under the budget cap. the new teams are only spending 40M so it wouldnt be surprising if there cars would be unreliable to save money or just not up to par with those that are dumping the money into the sport. in which case now you just have moving road blocks on the course running a race against the other 40M teams while you got the super fast cars trying to run there race while avoiding the moving road blocks. itd be kinda like the le mans series with 2 classes running but at that speeds i don't think its a good idea.but then again it could be the opposite of the budget cap teams being alot fast with the aero regs and the non budget cap teams are slower. if that where the case then the FIA has a good argument for the budget cap.

The deal was that the 40M teams would get lots of fringies. Full enginerevs, as much windtunnel time their budgets would allow, and things like that. The teams above 40M would have to stay on this years rules.

 

[Ardius]

i think alot of you are forgetting the budget cap is optional. ferrari dont have to go with the budget cap but there car would be under the current restrictions while those that go with the budget cap would not. and i think that is whats leading to the two tier mentality by ferrari. your going to have teams like Ferrari McLaren and BMW all still dumping money into the sport while you have these new teams that are under the budget cap. the new teams are only spending 40M so it wouldnt be surprising if there cars would be unreliable to save money or just not up to par with those that are dumping the money into the sport. in which case now you just have moving road blocks on the course running a race against the other 40M teams while you got the super fast cars trying to run there race while avoiding the moving road blocks. itd be kinda like the le mans series with 2 classes running but at that speeds i don't think its a good idea.but then again it could be the opposite of the budget cap teams being alot fast with the aero regs and the non budget cap teams are slower. if that where the case then the FIA has a good argument for the budget cap.

It will never work, the performance gap between the teams would be too big, just like when we had N/A versus turbo, and nowadays with petrol versus diesel - they can never balance it fairly.
Two tier system is a rubbish idea, in my opinion it should be a budget cap with the rules and thats that.
Whether the budget cap should be higher is up for the teams to discuss, but the main point is that two tiers is a bad idea.

The manufacturers can already see they will end up leaving at the end of 2010 with these rules, so they may as well make a stand now and try and get it changed, and I hope they do or otherwise attempt to lower their budgets because a two-tier championship is the last thing F1 needs (other than the stupid winner-takes-all idea).

Well, with Ferrari, BMW and Toyota in a fight for Le Mans victory, maybe at least the tifosi would come watch? And with the audience, the sponsors have to go where their customers are too. And with a bigger spectacle comes better TV-coverage.

Le Mans will never have the same TV coverage as F1, even ignoring the fact its just 1 race, that happens on 1 weekend each year, compared to F1 with its 15+ races.
The audience just isn't there for 24 hour races, if you ask someone on the street who came 2nd in Le Mans last year and who came 2nd in F1 last year, I can bet the majority will know one and not the other.

 

[Small_Fryz]

As far as i know, all teams but, Brawn, Williams and Force India have stated they will not compete in 2010 if the rules remain the same, as the 40m budget cap does indeed allow extra rules and regulations, thus making it a two tiered system. Brawn, Williams and Force India dont agree with teh rules but without F1 they wouldnt survive so they have no choice but to enter. So basically if they could choose, they wouldnt enter either.

I dont think Ferrari is against A budget cap, they are against the budget cap proposed with the two tier regulations.

 

[ROAD_DOGG33J]

I think Ferrari don't like that they can't get an advantage by just shoving more money in.

 

[Peter]

If ferrari leaves, F1 will drop significantly in views. F1 without ferrari is just a jigsaw without half the pieces. And I don't want to see my boys down at Maranello quit after 60 years straight. They're probably just trying to intimidate the FIA and force them to obey their demands.

 

[Danny]

*Maranello

 

[Peter]

fixed

 

[Casio]

I wouldn't be watching F1 if it was just Brawn, Williams, Force India and a few new teams running around, I can tell you that.

 

[Vaxen]

Hopefully, FIA and FOTA (Ferrari in particular) were paying attention to what happened with the CART/IRL split.

 

[Casio]

If Ferrari, Toyota, BMW, Mclaren and Renault did go and form their own series. I'd definitely be watching that.

 

[prisonermonkeys]

What I don't understand is why Ferrari seem to think that there will actually be a two-tier system. In theory, it would exist, but to me the budget cap has been constructed in such a way that no-one in their right minds would run without it because of all the advantages it offers. The only reason Ferrari would be protesting is if they'd be considering running outside it becuse they think forty million pounds isn't enough to run a team (but Ecclestne has said that number is liable to change). But with all the freedom of design the budget cap offers, how can thy jusify not running under it? I'd be very surprised if the two-tier system somehow went through and there were crs running without the budget cap.

 

[Solid Lifters]

I think what they're doing to Formula 1 is horrible. We don't want price caps. It's F1! It's supposed to be the best of the best and not, "Blue Light Specials."

Instead of molesting F1, why don't they create a new league. Make all the cars the same car. Same body, chassis, engine, transmission, wheels, whings, etc. That way, it'll be cheap. That way a lot of different manufactures can join.

Allow whomever to pick a driver and start racing. No teams, only single drivers. They can call this new league Formula 1 Alike Racing Tournament. I'm sure it'll be a big hit.