Brown wants transparency & full answers from Abu Dhabi Inquiry
McLaren CEO Zak Brown says the investigation into the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix must be transparent and deliver a full and honest explanation of what happened. The controversy centring around the restart with one lap to go saw max Verstappen pass Lewis Hamilton to claim the title.
Brown believes that it is important for the sport’s credibility that fans are given a proper answer about what really happened and why some decisions were made. While he believes when the season begins in March the sport will move on, but that the investigation needed to be treated with the seriousness it deserves.
Asked by Motorsport.com about the potential damage that’s been done to F1’s image by the Abu Dhabi fall out, Brown said: “I think with all controversies in sport, in time, as soon as the next season starts, the wounds start to heal. But I do think the FIA needs to come out with a, here’s what happened, here’s how and why we think it happened.
“Here’s what was right, here’s what was wrong, and whatever they’re going to come out within the report, and then show that they’ve taken action to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
The FIA has blamed the scale of the Abu Dhabi controversy on fans and the media ‘misunderstanding’ the situation, but several fans, journalists and teams remain confused and unhappy about the way the events unfolded.
Brown thinks the decision wasn’t malicious, but says a different decision could have probably been made, but before drawing conclusions. He says in sport some people disagree with the referee, and they sometimes get it wrong and right.
He also says that the FIA has to look at the wider running of the sport, as he believes that changes are needing to be made on a range of issues. Brown says that decision making progress and consistency on applying penalties is also needed.
Adding “We wrote to the FIA and F1 with seven races to go and said Lando is one pushing Perez off a track and not touching them away from losing his license. To me, points on your licence should be about dangerous driving, not racing incidents.”
Sprint races could be abandoned over costs
McLaren CEO Zak Brown says sprint races could be abandoned as the teams are at a stalemate over costs. Following the success at Silverstone, Monza and Interlagos, the sport was looking to double the number of sprint races this season with the first being at the opening race in Bahrain.
However, the green light has not yet been given because teams have yet to agree with F1’s commercial rights holder on a funding package for the races. It understood that teams were paid an extra $100,000 per event and an extra allowance of $450,00 and an extra $100,000 for damage,
It’s understood that this season, Liberty Media does not want to offer any extra allowance for crashes. Instead, its initial offer was a straight $500,000 payment per team for the first five events, plus an extra $150,000 for each event above that. This effectively meant an extra $2.65 million for each team for the six races in 2022.
Motorsport.com, says they understand that the offer has not gone down well with the bigger teams who run at the limit. They fear that the extra sprint races could force them to compromise on what resources they can devote to pure performance in the event of crashes.
According to Brown, one unidentified team wants the cost cap limit raised by $5 million dollars instead of what is on offer. That has prompted fears by the smaller teams that the cost is being spent on making their cars go faster, rather than necessary for the sprint races.
Two months today is reported scheduled to be the first sprint of the season, but the dispute over the money risks derailing the sprint race plans entirely.
F1’s current governance structure means that, for the rules to change in the current year, then it needs a ‘super majority’ of 28 votes from the 30 representatives in the F1 Commission.
While the ten votes each from F1 and FIA are guaranteed, getting eight teams to back the idea could be a problem with it understood that Red Bull, Mercedes and Ferrari are the most concerned about the situation, and could force the hand of customer teams to support their stance.
McLaren is currently happy with the financial package on offer, but is worried that there is a danger of a couple of outfits pulling rank and scuppering the sprint idea completely. Asked how F1 can get out of the impasse over money, Brown said: “We might not, which would be the unfortunate thing.”
Brown believes the best approach may well be to ditch plans for sprints in 2022 and instead focus on getting approval for 2023, where only six teams would need to support the plans because only an overall majority is needed for long term rule changes.
Melbourne organisers looking travel arrangements
Organisers of the Australian Grand Prix and the FIA are understood to be in discussions with the Australian Federal Government to ensure there are no grey areas for personnel and drivers ahead of April’s race.
The decision to deport Novak Djokovic, the world’s No.1 male tennis player, because of his defiance of Australia’s requirement for international arrivals to be fully vaccinated.
Speaking to local newspapers the CEO of the Australian Grand Prix Corporation, Andrew Westacott expects all Formula One drivers to comply with border rules and be fully vaccinated, if they are not already, when the Australian Grand Prix rolls around in April for the first time since 2019.
He said, “If you look at the cancellation of our event on March 13, 2020 and the staging of the next event, which will be April 2022, there have been 41 events around the world staged, and in every one of those jurisdictions there have been different stages of the pandemic and different border entry conditions.”
Westacott said that its a mandatory requirement for the personnel to be vaccinated. At the final three races in Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi, required drivers to be vaccinated to either enter their respective countries or attend the race, and no drivers missed due to not being vaccinated.
The only impact would be if someone tested positive in the days leading up to the race, with them needing to isolate before the race.
Speaking about the Djokovic saga, Westacott said it has been a massive global story that has brought focus on Melbourne and focus on the issue.
Looking ahead to the races return after two years, he added “If you said the Netflix factor, the Max [Verstappen] versus Lewis [Hamilton] factor, the fact that there’s also new spec cars that are designed for closer and more competitive racing for the first time in 2022.”
“The track being modified in Melbourne for the first time in 25 years, and also our love affair with Daniel Ricciardo and the first time we see him in McLaren colours in Melbourne … there are a massive amount of reasons why this is going to be a big, big event
Alonso believes Alpine in better shape than a year ago
Fernando Alonso believes that Alpine are in better shape than a year ago and can no longer use the lack of resources compared to the top teams as an excuse.
The French manufacturer finish fifth in the constructors, thanks part to Esteban Ocon’s shock win in Hungary and an Alonso podium in Qatar, two standouts results that pulled it over the line in the fight against Alpha Tauri.
Alpine is currently undergoing a restructure of its management, with executive director Marcin Budkowski and advisor Alain Prost both leaving ahead of the 2022 season, while former Aston Martin team principal Otmar Szafnauer has been tipped to join the Enstone team in a similar role.
2021 was an inconsistent season for the team, but they are confident that they have strengthened its trackside operations, CEO Laurent Rossi stated the team’s gradual improvement behind the scenes was just as important as Ocon’s win in Budapest. Alonso agreed that Alpine is “in better shape now” than at the start of last season.
He told Motorsport.com, “We are still not on top of all the problems, but everyone will have a different opinion. Obviously, with experience working for different teams, I could see some things that we were weak, other areas we were very strong. You try always to make the team stronger and stronger, and more prepared into 2022.”
“I think we are in better shape now than what we were in March, in Bahrain, but still a few things I’m sure that we’ll have to fix.” Alonso says that they need to close the gap with engine and aero performance, but it was difficult to know what that was because this year was unknown territory.
He believes the team has the right resources to cut the gap to the leading teams, explaining that Alpine will no longer have the excuse of operating to a smaller budget compared to F1’s biggest spenders Mercedes, Red Bull and Ferrari.
This has given the two-time champion optimism that they have the right resources as every team now has about the same budget, it was now about and it’s up to us to do a good car. If we don’t do it, we will learn from our mistakes.
Fallows to join Aston Martin earlier than expected
Aston Martin has reached a deal with Red Bull to allow Dan Fallows to start his new role as technical director in April. The team announced his appointment last June, however, Red Bull team principal Christian Horner said he would not be moving “within the next couple of years”.
But the teams have reached a compromise deal for Fallows to start on 2 April. Fallows has been with Red Bull since 2006, he was most recently the chief aerodynamics engineer.
He said in a joint statement that he was “proud” of what he had achieved with Red Bull, who won the drivers’ title with Max Verstappen last year and four consecutive drivers’ and constructors’ doubles with Sebastian Vettel from 2010-13.
Fallows said, “I am looking forward to next season and a new challenge.”
