McLaren agrees to FIA monitoring for switch Mercedes
McLaren has agreed to be monitored by the FIA for their switch to Mercedes engines next year to ensure it does not make changes for extra performance gains.
The switch to Mercedes from Renault coinciding with next years regulation change, which has been postponed until 2022 because of the Coronavirus. This means the cars designed this season will also be used in 2021.
Teams will have to homologate much of their current cars, but McLaren has been given special dispensation to make some chassis changes because it is the only outfit that plans to switch power units.
Speaking to the media via teleconferencing, team principal Andreas Seidl said the circumstances of fitting a different engine into the current car meant there would be compromises. But, says that any changes will only be done if essential for fitting the Mercedes power unit.
He explained to Motorsport.com, “For sure there will be restrictions in terms of how good we can integrate this power unit into the current car/ We have agreed together with the FIA that they will monitor very closely that we are only allowed to do the changes that are absolutely necessary to install the Mercedes power unit.”
“So they will monitor closely that we don’t touch any other areas in the surroundings of the power unit which will give us, let’s say, additional performance gains.” Seidl says McLaren was fully understanding of the situation and accept cost savings need to be made.
Seidl was clear that, despite the dramatic delay in the arrival of the 2021 new cars, McLaren never pondered postponing its switch to Mercedes.
If the 2020 season is extended into 2021 before the 2021 season begins he says there shouldn’t be any problem in extending the relationship with Renault to cover racing in early 2021.
Battles with Leclerc not important – Vettel
Sebastian Vettel says winning personal battles with Charles Leclerc matters much less to him than how successful Ferrari is against its rivals. Vettel knows going into this season he needs to up his game if he is to beat Leclerc and challenge for wins.
The Monacan had an impressive first season with the Italian manufacturer, making the four-times champion aware that he needs to deliver this season to guarantee his future with Ferrari beyond the end of the year. Although much made of the rivalry he has with Leclerc, the four-time champion says the only thing that is important to him is that Ferrari becomes the best in F1.
Vettel in an exclusive interview with Motorsport.com, “It is not so important whether I have five points more or less [compared to Leclerc]. The important thing is that we are heading in the right direction as a team.”
“Last year was a step back because we were not as strong as the years before. There’s reasons.” He says Ferrari needs to understand the reasons why they failed last season and get the team back to the top of the sport.
Adding, “I’m not a finance guy at all, but you just need to follow the finance market, the stock market for a day and it goes up and down. If you take the same behaviour 15 years ago, people would panic.”
Bianchi would have the same success as Leclerc
Daniel Ricciardo believes Charles Leclerc is currently achieving the success Jules Bianchi would have enjoyed at Ferrari, naming the late Frenchman as one of his most underrated rivals.
Bianchi had looked to land the Ferrari seat from its driver academy and his impressive run with Marussia. He scored the teams only points at the 2014 Monaco Grand Prix, finishing ninth in what is widely regarded as one of the great underdog displays in recent F1 history.
However, at that years Japanese Grand Prix the Frenchman crashed into a tractor during a typhoon causing severe head injuries. He died nine months later as a result of the injuries at the age of 25.
In a post on Twitter entitled ‘Dan’s Diary’, current Renault F1 driver Ricciardo picked his five most underrated opponents from his time on the grid, naming Bianchi as one of them.
Ricciardo said, “It wasn’t like Jules was underrated, but we never got to see him in a top car, so maybe people didn’t appreciate how good he was going to be.”
“You think of his drive-in that Marussia in Monaco in 2014, the team’s first points. Monaco is like Macau in that there’s no way to fluke a result there. It was absolutely on merit.”
Ricciardo believes the success that Leclerc is currently enjoying, and that breakthrough 2019 season would have also been able to have been achieved by Bianchi.
He wrote, “It’s another part of what makes his story so sad, because [Bianchi] would have been in a top team and a race winner by now for sure.”
“In some ways, I feel Charles is doing now what Jules would have been doing. It’s like Charles is the delayed version of what Jules would have done with the success he’s having.” Ricciardo first met Bianchi in junior categories but soon realised that the Bianchi was apart from other drivers.
Adding “As a junior through karting, Jules was the guy. We met training at Formula Medicine in Viareggio in Italy and everyone, even at that age when we were all 17, everyone treated him like he was an F1 driver already.”
Other underrated drivers he named were Marcus Ericsson, Robert Merhi, Vitantonio Liuzzi and Jenson Button
Liberty CEO makes $44m in compensation package
Liberty Media President and CEO Greg Maffei received a total compensation package of over $44m in 2019, documents released by the company have revealed.
Maffei is the boss of F1 CEO Chase Carey, and also oversees the company’s other major investments, including the Atlanta Braves baseball team and the Sirius XM radio network. The financial arrangements emerged after the company filed its annual report to the US government ahead of its AGM in May.
He received a total compensation package of $44,045,070, representing a significant increase over the previous two years. He was paid $19.8m in 2017, and $20.1m in 2018. A five per cent rise on his five-year contract, equalling $1.1m of his wages, the figure includes various bonuses and stock options.
$93,055 of his wages came from other business like F1 and Live Nation.
The accounts say, “Our compensation committee reviewed Mr Maffei’s 2019 performance and noted his efforts in supporting Formula 1 strategic initiative and extending the SiriusXM franchise.”
Maffei signed a new five-year contract at a fixed basic salary of $3m, plus a “one-time cash commitment bonus of $5m [and] an annual target cash performance bonus equal to $17m, upfront equity awards and annual equity awards.”
Liberty has also revealed that the average 2019 salary across all its businesses, including F1, was $93,055, or 1/473rd of Maffei’s total. But the company faces huge challenges with all operations including Live Nation, sports teams and general business will face challenges and loses due to the coronavirus.
Austria not apposed to race without fans
The Austrian Vice-Chancellor and Sports Minster says Werner Kogler the government is not opposed to this year’s Grand Prix at the Red Bull Ring taking place without spectators.
The race looks likely to be the season opener, after the French government announced a ban on mass events until 1st July, on Monday. It is currently scheduled as the second race of the season on the weekend of 3rd – 5th July.
Asked about the race, Kogler said, “We don’t want to get in the way.” However, he said it was different to staging a football match without fans because of the number of technical staff involved.
The ten teams each have around sixty people in the paddock on race weekends while Formula One staff, plus technical and safety officials as well as media and broadcast personnel, would bring the total attending the race to more than 1,000.
That would increase if support races were allowed to run, currently F2, F3 and local series.
But warned travel restrictions could be a bigger hurdle than social distancing rules. Kogler added “This must then be considered within the framework of the existing restrictions on entry and exit (into the country). I don’t want to anticipate if an exemption will be needed here or there.”
2020 season should be abandoned – Mosley
Former FIA president Max Mosley believes that the 2020 season should cancel its entire 2020 season due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. So fair the first nine races of the season have either been cancelled or postponed due to the pandemic.
Doubt was placed on the season-opening French Grand Prix at the end of June after French president Emmanuel Macron extended the nationwide ban on mass gatherings until mid-July.
With no end to the coronavirus crisis in sight, Mosley feels it would be better to call off the entire 2020 season to end the gnawing uncertainty for teams, promoters and partners.
Speaking about cancelling the season, Mosley said “Then the teams and the race organisers would have certainty so they can plan and take measures. At the moment they are in limbo and many are losing money”
“By waiting, you risk making things worse without having the certainty of winning anything. There’s no guarantee that the races can start again in July and it actually seems increasingly unlikely.”
Mosley described planned for closed doors races, suggested by motorsport and technical managing director Ross Brawn, as a financial disaster for race organisers.
He urged F1 and the FIA to “act now and take the opportunity to reorganise and restructure Formula 1 to put it on a much sounder financial footing for the future.”
Cut further with opportunity of Coronavirus – Agag
Formula E CEO Alejandro Agag believes that Formula One’s bosses should seize the opportunity from the coronavirus crisis to ‘shakedown’ the sport’s financial model and slash the budget cap to $75 million.
Later this week, Liberty, the teams and the FIA are holding discussions to reduce the budget cap from $175m to $150m to reduce the impact of the pandemic. Agag believes that with negotiations to renew the Concorde Agreement must not be postponed by a year, with push should be made to think again about how its business model is structured.
In an exclusive interview with Motorsport.com, Agag said: “I think generally for motorsport this could be an opportunity. And, specifically for Formula 1, this could be a massive opportunity; to restructure the whole model.”
“Maybe it’s an opportunity for all the teams to share revenue on the same amounts. I’m also hearing of budget caps of $125m, something like that, why not a cost cap of $75m and make it profitable for everybody?”
Agag says it might be a good thing the eighth Concorde Agreement isn’t agreed yet as there is an in-balance in the deal, which could still lead to a complete shake-up of the terms. The current agreement is due to expire on the 31st December 2020.
Last week, FIA president Jean Todt made clear that he was mindful costs needed bringing down, as he reckoned the $300 million budgets of the top teams was too high. Todt told Motorsport.com, “In each disaster, in each crisis, you have a lot of bad but you have some good,”.
“So, among the good is that we have the opportunity of making things better for the future. And mainly in Formula One, we reached some heights [with costs], which for me are not reasonable and which we need to address.”
Agag says one of the things Formula One needs to address is the differential between the biggest teams and the smaller outfits – which has been exacerbated by extra payments older outfits are given for past success.
He thinks Todt is right to push for a ‘New Deal’, where the whole motorsport landscape is changed in response to the crisis caused by Coronavirus.
Agag admits that he is not closely involved in the F1 discussions, but he says that his views are simply how he thinks he would approach making changes. “I’m not in F1 or running it, and it is run by very capable people, and I’m sure they are thinking about all these things,” he added.
“But I would use this as a major correction of the business principles of F1. So it could be a very interesting opportunity.”
