FLOYD ON F1: Sport’s owners, gatekeeper and teams not on same page

A week has gone by since the FIA released the findings of the 2021 season cost cap audit.

As we all know, Red Bull and Aston Martin were the two not receiving a clean bill of health. Both failed on procedural issues, but Red Bull were found to have exceeded the cost cap budget maximum of $145 million (about R2.6 billion) by a “minor overspend”.

At the time of writing, the amount of the “overspend” is still unknown, as is the penalty to be issued by the governing body.

We should not be surprised, since the FIA has never been renowned for speedy decisions or clarity on how such decisions were made.

‘Strip Max of title’

The media is full of demands that Max Verstappen be stripped of his 2021 title, with the championship retro-awarded to Lewis Hamilton. Others call for limited wind tunnel time, a hefty financial penalty or reduction of Red Bull’s annual budget cap.

Of course all this is based on the possibility the offenders’ appeal will be unsuccessful and we have no idea what the excessive expenditure was used for.

Toto Wolff has announced Mercedes will be prepared to overspend if Red Bull is not punished for the minor breach. Ferrari has also voiced its corporate dissatisfaction.

Quite right. Infringements of regulations and rules should always be punished. But in the last few seasons, a few have been quietly swept under the carpet.

Past F1 infringements

That sudden decrease in performance of the Ferrari power unit, mid-2019 effectively handed the championship to Mercedes. This led to Maranello reaching an out-of-court settlement with the FIA – a strange state of affairs.

Then it was the Dual Axis Steering as used by Mercedes in 2020 which was rapidly banned for 2021.
Spotted during pre-season testing, it was too late for other teams to follow suit, but the German team were allowed to run it legally for the 2020 season, a strange decision.

Recently the lack of rapid decisions has begun to seriously confuse teams, broadcasters and fans. For instance, the three-hour delayed announcement of Sergio Perez’s victory in Singapore, when stewards delivered a rather strange punishment for two identical infringements. One received a five-second penalty, the other a reprimand.

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Then Japan, where no-one noticed the wording regarding the awarding of points when a race was curtailed before the prescribed number of laps. Post race interviews showed baffled expressions when it was announced Verstappen had won the 2022 drivers’ championship.

Void of info transfer

It appears there is a void between the teams, the FIA and owners Liberty Media, regarding accurate information transfer.

With the owners’ big push for a new audience following the sport, surely such a lack of, or total misinformation is not acceptable, particularly in the younger generation’s world of social media immediacy.

Surely the three parties within the sport can reconcile this glowing inefficiency and prevent further confusion, for the sake of F1.

To see the rest of the 2022 F1 calender, click here.