Todt:"...reduction in costs is in the best interests of everyone."
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In a radical move to reduce the cost of development and racing in motorsport’s highest league, the FIA has announced that they will start enforcing the rules in their own interpretation, much to the dismay of several of the teams.
Now it is true that costs of developing a top flight F1 car that is both competitive and reliable are astronomical. Only three teams really have the resources to compete at this level (BWM-Williams, McLaren-Mercedes, and Ferrari). These teams almost have a damn the costs, build the car attitude and so long as they are around, the costs of keeping pace will continue to rise.
The FIA in a rare press release has documented several new interpretations of the rules to try and mange out some of the costs of the sport. Of course they wait until only days and weeks before the launches of the 2003 season cars to do so, rather than at the end of last year, almost ensuring that the cars presented at Melbourne will not have been created in mind with the "new" regulations.
Here are the changes (and the sections of the FIA rule book) for the 2003 season:
1. Article 61: Ban on: telemetry from the car to the pit, telemetry from the pit to the car, radio communication between driver and pit.
2. Article 70: Only two cars will be scrutinized.
3. Article 84e: Spare cars will not be scrutinized without exceptional circumstances.
4. Article 71a: Cars will have to go to parc ferme after their second qualifying run, to be released shortly before the start of the race.
5. Article 61: Electronic driver controls will be eliminated
6. Schedule III of Concorde Agreement: Teams can propose to eliminate the clause stating that components (minus the engine and gearbox) can be shared among teams.
7. The Friday sessions will now be a test event rather than part of the race weekend.
So what does this all mean? Under item 1, the team’s won’t be able to get feedback from the driver at all. The intent is to go back to the good old days when pit board communication was high tech. Even NASCAR allows 2-way radios.
Items 2 and 3 attempt to reduce the manufacturing costs and also ensure that teams actually qualify with the same cars that they are going to race. For example, Schumacher will no longer be able to set up one chassis for the wet and one for the dry and see which one works best.
Item 4 is the biggie. This rule is specifically designed to eliminate any difference between qualifying trim and race trim. No more special brake rotors, different duct work, different wings, ballast location, etc. It also means no more "qualifying" engines. While in spirit, the rule is to reduce the costs associated with extra component development. In practice, don’t be surprised if even more costs are associated with ensuring that all components will be able to last the entire weekend.
While there hasn’t been much backlash yet, don’t expect the teams to take this one without a fight. Sure, some of the smaller teams will be all for the rule changes, but the larger teams that have spent billions over the years on development of their cars and brands don’t want to see the top of the sport retract back towards F3000. The fans want to see the best technology being driven around the track with the best drivers. Even if it is a boring parade, so be it. That’s F1. Push comes to shove, the teams will leave. IRL’s success and the near death of CART have proved that you can spilt a series and be successful, if you have the right people on board.
Jean Todt summarized his concerns with "it is clear that one team might be in favour of one modification but not another, with another team adopting the opposite view. We will have to reach an agreement which suits all parties involved. The only thing that is certain is that a reduction of costs is in the best interests of everyone."
The FIA also released their interpretation on changes that need to be made for the 2004 season and beyond. Rather than break those rules down here, we’ll wait and see how the 2003 season develops first. The Ferrari F1 launch is scheduled for February 7, 2003 and VeloceToday will have coverage.
