F1 links: FOTA wants F1 back in the USA
30 June 2009 by Keith Collantine
Not the biggest day for F1 news – but some good news for American followers:
The Chairman replying to the fans
Luca di Montezemolo has got good news for F1 fans in America: "As far as the tracks are concerned where the races are held, the historical ones have always had a great fascination; for Ferrari and for all the other teams it will be important to get back to North America."
Gracia: Mosley could run for re-election
Spanish Motorsport federation head Carlos Gracia: "I believe Max Mosley has a lot of support and I would think twice before running against him, because I don't want to take any risks that may damage Spanish motorsport."
These are links I’ve bookmarked using Delicious. You can see my Delicious profile here.
More out-of-F1-cockpit antics for drivers this season; Kimi is going to have a crack at the Rally Finland next month. Good on him.
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/76623
No more MAX Please
If the news is confirmed, and after the dust settles, we will end up with the same Fab Four again :
Bernie, Flavor Flav, Lou and Max.
” We shall never cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started, and see the place as if for the first time ”
T.S. Eliot
We just have to pretend that we see them for the first time
This is why we need a breakaway series. F1 doesn’t need patching up, it needs rebuilding. It’ll hurt it in the short term, maybe, but in the long term things will be better. The problem is Max, his supporters, the FIA, and Bernie. They all need to go or the problem isn’t going to be fixed.
Oh oh oh i agree so much about patching not being the cure. If your house is falling apart you don’t patch it,, you demolish and start again. OR, maybe even think of moving.
So demolish F1/FIA and rebuild.
Or move away and move into a breakaway.
I completely agree with you. All changes to the rules need to be agreed upon by the teams so nothing crazy happens.
I really hope the FOTA can get the USA GP back. That would mean I could watch a race live at a reasonable time! Most of the time races start at 5 AM, sometimes they start at 1 AM…
That is correct Kovy. It is like getting divorced and re-married and moving on. That is what FOTA should have maintained. In fact they would have had plenty of support. I don’t want to say that I am not happy some resolution was made, but we still dont have piece. It is just more of the same. Next time FOTA say “we want to make a breakaway series” NOBODY will take them seriously. Bernie and Mosley have managed to manipulate FOTA into signing, and they still hold the power. Mosley is a lunatic and has managed to double cross FOTA. And as much as I love FOTA, Montezemolo made a mistake with his latest dealings amongst Bernie and Mosley. They are just like a little love triangle group. Who knows what they actually did during their little group meeting – because nobody else was there to witness anything!
Oh, and regarding that FOTA wants F1 back in USA. Well its not up to them is it, Bernie still holds the power on that and will for ever.
well all i want is for them to come back to long beach!!!
So, Someone is afraid of running against Max, cause they feel that if they do, and possibly lost it would damage their countries involvement in motorsports.
So basically Max Mosley is the Saddam Hussein of Motorsports. Elected official, only elected cause if they don’t vote for him or heaven forbid run against them, they’ll end up dead.
Rikadyn you’re not possibly inferring that Max Mosley is anything like Saddam Hussein, a World renowned DICTATOR? Do you think Mosley should end up like Hussein too?
Hussein used to refuse to admit he was dictator too.
So the real question is: does Max have genuine support out there from the Motorsport Federations, or are they all just afraid of what he will do if they don’t support him?
This is no way to run a sport! How can anything genuinely benificial come from an organisation run on fear alone?
I say to FOTA and the Motorsport Federations – if its that bad then GET OUT and START AGAIN!
Yes DGR-F1 Max has brought us to this situation but nobody in the FIA seems to want to believe or accept the fact. Maybe FOTA and other motorsport bodies should unite and take down the FIA as they fear. And maybe something we all can trust can come from the ruins.
I was one who felt bad when i heard of the deal made to save F1. I feel that F1 as we know it is not going to recover, there is too much to fix. LET’S JUST START AGAIN as DGR-F1 says.
It is NOT the Motorsport Federations that vote on the FIA Presidency! The FIA is made up of representatives from 200+ motoring clubs in 125 countries, the vast majority of which have little or nothing to do with motorsports. They are involved in auto touring and travel and insurance and they all have equal votes in the General Assembly which elects the President. These are the people that gave Max a vote of confidence in June 2008 after the sex scandal (103 votes in support and 55 against, with seven abstentions and four invalid votes) and it is they who will elect the new President in October.
Well jagged maybe that is why the FIA needs a complete overhaul of how it is run.
Has the voting system always been that way do you know?
As far as the Presidency, yes it has. The rest of the structure has changed a bit over the years; see:
and:
The problems with the FIA are the same as with any global organization made up of national members (The UN, The Olympics etc.). The problem with Mosley is that he had always been held in check by the Concorde Agreement but it expired at the end of 2007. Ferrari signed an extension to the Concorde on Jan. 19, 2005 (This is when they got the extra money and Tech Reg. Veto) which killed the breakaway threat from the Grand Prix Manufacturers Association. They were followed by Red Bull, Jordan and Williams signing separate deals in 2005. On May 14, 2006, the five remaining GPMA-backed teams signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the commercial rights holders. It is under this patchwork of agreements that Mosley had gained such sweeping power over F1 in the last couple of years, no longer being held back by the constraints of The Concorde. He and Ecclestone have always been a team with Max being the public face and Bernie pulling the strings in the background (Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain). But with Max running amok and Ferrari jumping ship and joining The Rebel Alliance, Bernie found himself with no choice but to throw Max under the bus.
Damn, the links got messed up again
FIA
Mosley
Thanks for the info Jagged. All well appreciated
It would be good to see all these people who are urging Max to stand for re-election step forward & make themselves known.
I`d like to know who they are as I`m sure would many others.
Spain would get damaged but lets face facts there are two countries over which Mosley doesn’t hold as much power over as he once did, they are both Germany and USA. Both have recently lost their respected GP’s and in the case of Germany house four major car manufacturers (read racing teams) who are Mercedes, BMW, Porsche and Audi.
Hopefully FOTA have an out clause on what they signed, if not run both series and deliberately field crap cars in this series and really turn it into F3!
I think the headline “FOTA wants F1 back in the USA” is a little misleading, Keith.
While I`m sure that`s probably the case, in this instance di Montezemolo was speaking to fans on the Ferrari site.
He said “We” & went on to recall historic races for Ferrari at Sebring & for Schumacher at Indianapolis.
We need to be careful to distinguish between FOTA & Ferrari. Blur the line & we only give ammunition to those, like Max, who oppose FOTA`s aims. They try to give the impression that FOTA is Ferrari & the other teams are just the chorus line. That isn`t true.
Well said.
Yes, I agree as well, every FOTA team should be looked at with different eyes. Especially Ferrari, as I dislike the fact that they can get themselves a boost in popularity due to most fans’ liking of the FOTA, as they were and are only in the protest as they weren’t on the winning side this season. If they’d had been on the level of Brawn GP through the season, they would have actively denouced and refused any talks about breakaway series.
F1 Live has announced…
“
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Yes, Silly Season is in full swing!
Kimi will run WRC Rally Finland next month.
Spanish press says Ferrari will announce Alonso at Monza to go with their Santander sponsorship next year.
di Montezemolo has several times mentioned running 3 cars next year and Valentino Rossi speculation immediately began flying about; even though Rossi said a few months ago that the time for a move to F1 has passed. Could they just be cover for a move on Vettel’s part?
So in 2010, Kimi to WRC fulltime and Ferrari running 3 cars for Alonso, Vettel and Massa???
I dont think Ferrari can just run three cars. I dont think the rules allow that as yet. I believe this got triggered while FOTA were thinking about the breakaway series in which case they were planning to run 3 cars. And btw Rossi is far from an efficient F1 driver, basically he is not even as good as the slowest F1 driver we had. He was well off pace during his last Ferrari test drive.
We don’t know Exactly what the rules will be yet. Montezemolo has mentioned the possibility of running 3 cars several times since the agreement was announced, once at the actual Press Conference announcing the agreement with Bernie and Max!
NOw is there enough room in pit garages for 3 cars?
Well if they allow “some” teams to have 3 cars then they must change the way in which constructors points are awarded. Because if one team has more cars on the grid their chance to win the constructors title is much higher which is unfair and illogical.
But if we make all teams have 3 cars then that would be insane. Too many cars on the grid. The GP is almost busy enough as it is specially to the driver who is P1.
But you are right lets see what the rules are first…
The 3 car rule has existed in F1 for many years if the numbers on the grid fall below a certain figure.
As for Rossi, I agree. That’s why I think he’s just a smokescreen for signing Vettel.
So if the rules can be swung to allow the bigger teams (who can afford it) to run three cars each, can they not be swung the other way to allow other teams to run only one car each, thereby saving on expensive things like drivers, extra pit crew, travel costs, fuel rigs etc etc…..?
So DGR-F1 why not go the other way and have all teams with just one car and driver and then have 26 different teams each sharing a garage.
There would be no team orders, only maybe agreements between teams to help each other.
DGR-F1, I believe that all teams will have to have the same number of cars, otherwise they must modify the way in which the constructors points are awarded.