Montezemolo still wants three-car teams

F1 Fanatic round-up

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Luca di Montezemolo repeats his demand F1 for three-car teams in Formula 1.

Links

Season’s greetings and surprise presents. Fiorano hosts the Italian F1 media dinner (Ferrari)

“We hope next year will be as good a season as this one and not one like 2009, when the championship seemed to be drugged. The small teams? Honestly, I feel it would be better to have the opportunity of running a third car rather than seeing cars that would struggle even in GP2: it’s an idea we will put forward again strongly for the future.

“On the subject of the new circuits, I have to say it would be better if more thought was given to the races with an increase in overtaking opportunities with less effort going into beautiful architecture.

“Then we must unblock this absurd limitation on testing. Formula 1 is the only sport in which there is no chance to train. It is like asking Real Madrid, Milan or Inter to play with smooth soled boots in the rain or not to warm up before a Champions League game.”

FIA Gala 2010 – F1 Season Highlights (Youtube)

The Abu Dhabi Grand Prix race video edit is also now available on F1.com.

F1 2011 Technical Regulations – Detailed and Explained (Scarbs F1)

“The driver adjustable front wing is now deleted from the rules and instead the rear wing is now driver adjustable. This is because the expected benefit of greater front wing angle never provided the driver with more grip when following another car.”

Soft Pauer launch 2011 Timing and Track Positioning App (F1)

Eighteen quid seems very expensive from what I’ve seen of this. If you’ve got it tell us what you think of it in the comments.

Lotus legacy unclaimed – Gerard Lopez (BBC)

“We are sure to be called what we are going to be called and I’m not sure they will be called that way. It’s pure speculation that there might be four cars using the same name.”

McLaren Group achieves carbon trust standard (McLaren)

“This achievement makes McLaren the first and only Formula 1 team to be officially recognised by the Carbon Trust for taking action on climate change.”

Liuzzi: Force India seat is safe (Autosport)

“Each time a driver is said to interest Force India, looks like it’s always me the one who has to move over. This is obviously just what part of the media says, because on my part I’m very calm.”

Comment of the day

Luca di Montezemolo’s got nothing on our Steph:

"For this Felipe gets seven minus." Is that his grade or what he lost at Germany?
Steph

Site updates

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Happy birthday!

Happy brithday to steph90!

On this day in F1

One year ago today Virgin announced it had taken over the team entered by Manor Motorsport, and confirmed Lucas di Grassi as their second driver alongside Timo Glock.

Image © Ferrari spa

Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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89 comments on “Montezemolo still wants three-car teams”

  1. I really wish Luca Montezemolo wouldn’t speak at all. Grrrrr.

    1. Yup! The only thing that makes sense is the comment about the nature of modern tracks- the main part being the tracks themselves seems to be an afterthought compared to the facilities.

      1. I thought the testing ban comment was spot on. At the very least there should be Monday testing. I’d prefer somewhere between Monday testing and unlimited testing.

        When it takes a driver half the season to understand how the tyres work, somethings wrong.

        1. Monday testing I think isn’t a great idea, as it would make the end to the weekend somewhat anti climactic.

  2. Well done, COTD makes a nice present and it’s well deserved.

    Happy Birthday Steph !!

    1. No kidding! Have a great birthday Steph (same as my sister’s) and nice work on the comment, touché.

      1. Happy Birthday.

        1. Happy birthday Steph! And I loved your comment too. :)

    2. Happy Birthday Steph!!!! Hope you have a great year and many happy returns, wish you all the best!

      COTD and a B-Day.. Nice! :D

    3. Magnificent Geoffrey Presents – Steph: A Birthday Tribute

      Stephanie Farnsworth
      Is such a nice lass,
      Though I’ve never met her
      I know she’s got class.

      Highly respected
      For all of her thoughts,
      And forever loyal
      To the Prancing Horse.

      From her many comments
      It’s easy to see,
      She’s F1Fanatic’s
      Number 1 Tifosi.

      A regular patron
      Of all the live blogs,
      Despite of the issues
      That plague her laptop

      Although I don’t cheer
      When Fernando wins,
      We tend to agree
      On most other things.

      Like Smedley’s a legend
      And king of the pits,
      And that Piquet Jr
      Is a bit of a twit.

      So cheers to you Steph
      And for you, I wish maybe,
      A few wins next year
      For your Felipe Baby!

      1. You’ve way too much time on your hands! :P Now you had better hope she reads it!

      2. That is the most impressive thing I’ve ever read in these comments… you deserve a COTD.

        Oh, and happy birthday Steph!

        “And that Piquet Jr
        Is a bit of a twit.”
        … Lol…

      3. Magnificent Geoffrey – first punster, now bard
        For Steph’s Happy Birthday he sure has worked hard!

        Happy B-day Steph and hats off Geoffrey.

        1. Ha! Nice one.

      4. Nice work, and happy birthday Steph!

      5. Mag thank you very much. That has to be the best thing I’ve read all year. I’ll try not to let it go to my head though :P

        Thank you Keith for Cotd and thanks so much for all of your birthday wishes everyone! I do love when this site turns into a little love fest as it really has a great community.

        Didn’t PM get Cotd on his birthday too? I can honestly say it’s a brilliant present :)

        1. Happy Birthday Steph, have a great one.

      6. Wonderful composition! Will you make one for my birthday as well?
        Happy birthday Steph!

      7. Nice one! Are you a poet by trace Mag?? :P

        Happy Birthday Steph. Hope it was a good one! :D

    4. Happy Birthday Steph!

    5. And a very good COTD it is.

      Happy birthday Steph!

  3. Im one of those poor souls who cant access the forum. I’m using chrome but have tried it in safari and firefox as well and still no luck.
    Basically when i click to access the forum all that loads is the navigation banner thingo at the top, and the f1 fanatic logo + add banner thingo

    Then it just keeps trying to load the rest of the page but never does

    1. Me too. It gets stuck in an infinite loop..

      Sending request…
      Waiting for hosting.adjug.com…
      Waiting for afe2.specificclick.net…
      Waiting for ads.adviva.net…
      Waiting for ads.eu-e.planning.net…

      Don’t know if I got all those exact, but they go by pretty fast so it’s hard to see.

      I run Chrome on a mac, but I’ve tried it in Firefox and Safari as well with the same results. It won’t load on my iPhone running the current iOS either, gets to the same point.

      1. yep thats exactly what i get, i didnt have to motivation to write that stuff out because i just woke up lol.

        and im running bootcamp on my mac, so i can run windows, get the same problem with windows so i dont think its just a mac problem

        1. I am running firefox & experiencing the same problem as explained by Julian.

          1. ok mines working again.. havn’t been able to get on in 2 days

      2. Yep, that’s what I’ve been getting. I told Keith a day or two ago and he’s been looking into it I think.

    2. Using Windows 7, IE8 will eventually load the Forum after 30 minutes or so. Firefox keeps going through a loop of trying to load ads.adviva and ads.eu.e-planning and something about a plug-in over and over.

    3. Thanks for the feedback guys. From what I can tell so far it’s an intermittent problem that’s affecting certain versions of certain browsers. If anyone is able to tell me what browser version you’ve experienced the problem in it will help identify a fix.

      1. I have seen that, I have opned the forum from other PC & it opens but with mine it don’t.
        I am using Firefox 3.6.13

        1. Thanks Wasi. You may find it will open some times and not at other times. Working on the problem.

      2. It’s working for me now. I’m running Chrome for mac version 8.0.552.215. It’s super slow, but I think that’s due to my free in flight wifi provided by Google at cruising altitude. I’m getting about 14kbps!!!

        1. Actually on further examination I don’t think it’s my bandwidth issue that’s causing the forum to load so slowly. All the main pages on the site (including this one) load within about 5-10 seconds. The forum’s been spinning for many minutes and isn’t fully loaded. So it’s still not downloading so great. Once I’m back on terra firma I’ll update my browser (I think there’s a newer Chrome release) and see if that has any effect.

    4. Give Opera a try!.

  4. In the team no one has told me anything about it, I have a contract for next year, and I’m already at work with that in mind. I feel safe, not just with the contract I have in my hands, but also with the fine relationship I have with the team.

    I’m sure I could find an identical quote from Kimi in 2009

    1. Except we knew Alonso would be at Ferrari well before this time last year.

      1. Yes, I think we knew around Monza time but the point is that Kimi thought his contact was safe as well, or at least he said he did.

    2. i’m sure he knows his time is up, FI would be out of their mind to keep him after his below par performance….

  5. someone please tell me what track it is at where WEB and VET are arguing in the FIA gala 2010 video. (look at the video thumbnail above!)

      1. I think its after Qualifying at Silverstone.

  6. “On the subject of the new circuits, I have to say it would be better if more thought was given to the races with an increase in overtaking opportunities with less effort going into beautiful architecture.”

    So why did you decide to build Ferrari World next to the Abu Dhabi track? Why not build it near Monza or somewhere less “beautiful”?

    Shut up you blithering idiot. Just hurry up and get into Italian politics. With BS coming out your mouth quicker than a cow with diarrhoea, you would fit in perfectly.

  7. Honestly, I feel it would be better to have the opportunity of running a third car rather than seeing cars that would struggle even in GP2: it’s an idea we will put forward again strongly for the future.

    This is beginning to sound suspiciously like a party line. If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a hundred times – Ferrari clearly want influence over the smaller teams. The more influence they have, the more political power they gain, and the more political power they gain, the more potential there is for them to shape the future of the sport. And given that they’ve already demonstrated a willingness to wantonly use team orders rather than have races decided on the outcome of skill, I have grave concerns for that future.

    1. Homogenization of the grid can’t be a good thing. When there are lots of 2 car teams if one fails we still have a decent sized grid. With few large teams it would be devastating if a team failed.

      1. Exactly, but di Montezemolo wants to muscle the smaller teams out of the way. If the grid size is fixed at twenty-four, and we have three-car teams, that means we only need eight teams, which will probably be Ferrari, McLaren, Red Bull, Mercedes, the new Lotus Renault, Williams, Toro Rosso and either Sauber or Force India (and Ferrari would prefer Sauber because of the engine deal).

        You’re right in saying a homogenised grid is not a good thing. Look at V8 Supercars, where Holden control 20 of the 28 cars – more than 75% of the grid. They’re already trying to use their political influence to discourage other manufacturers from joining the category to protect their control of the grid, which will maximise their chances of winning races and championships and thus help them sell more road cars.

        If we move to three-car teams, then Ferrari will control 12.5% of the grid. If Sauber are one of those eight teams and Ferrari continue to supply engines, that means they control 12.5% of the grid and influence another 12.5% of the grid, making them effectively control a quarter of it. And while Red Bull might also have Toro Rosso, Ferrari will continue to supply engines to them in order to offset Red Bull’s influence over them. In short, Ferrari will have more power than anyone else and will continue to influence the sport as they see fit. Which can only end badly.

        1. This to me seems like a typical anti-Ferrari post. Which is quite common on a British blog…

          Now, I’d ask you would you feel more happy and at ease if, hmm lets say – Mercedes decided to supply RBR with an engine for 2011 or 2012/2013, and instead of Sauber, Force India got a the last grid place?

          So, since all of the above said is very plausable, we’d have Mercedes GP, McLaren-Mercedes, Red Bull-Mercedes, Force India-Mercedes, Williams-Cosworth, Ferrari, Toro Rosso-Ferrari & Lotus Renault! I.e. 4 Mercedes vs 2 Ferrari engines!!!

          I bet you’d prefer this scenario! ;)

    2. Ferrari won’t stop until 2001 comes back, only with another car.

      I believe in three-car teams to an extent, because it gives more chances for good drivers to be in top cars. The reason Ferrari keep pushing the idea is because the only other alternative to bring this about is the much more preferable restricting of big team’s ability to out-spend upstart rivals. Closer cars would be a good thing too; have something like the new Indy formula, the same basic car but free to develop it how you want, with whatever engine you want in F1’s case.

      1. I’d be more concerned about what would happen if they got control of the rulebook. Let’s say they had it right now – what would happen?

        For one thing, it is likely they would be working on their 2012 car, having already developed the 2011 machine. They would slowly implement rules that favoured their cars for the next year and by always working on a car two years ahead of the current car, they’d be forcing everyone else to follow them. Ferrari would be the only real innovators, and they would move to silence anyone who came up with anything clever they hadn’t thought of. It would be a whole new era of Ferrari dominance, with no-one able to get close to them because Ferrari will have written the rules to suit their next car, rather than build their car to fit in with the rules.

        And that cannot be allowed to happen.

    3. A three-car Ferrari team, combined with team orders being officially allowed again… need we say more?

  8. Last time I checked Ferrari want a one car team.

    1. Pow!

      Poor dopey ol’ Luca, everytime he opens his trap, someone here lands a COTD. :)

    2. I think they actually want a 24 car team with no competitors on the grid, then they can choreograph every race start to finish.

      1. There’s a rumour that for one of the drivers they are talking to Piquet Jr.

        Every race needs at least one crash, and Piquet is a trained professional!

    3. Jameson you beat me and probably 12 other people to that remark :D

    4. Oh no, no Jameson, Ferrari and Luca Montezemolo clearly want a three car team. That will give them twice as many drivers to push around!

      Alonso, whilst in third: Beep, beep! Hey Luca, any chance those guys can move outta’ my way?

      Luca: Why certainly Fernando! I was just talking with Mr. Santander about that very issue.

      Rob Smedley: Damnit.

      1. Felipe’s problem is that he’s so mild mannered. Same with Barrichello. If they were pugnacious and obnoxious like their Latino brethren JPM and Nelson Piquet (Sr… not Jr.!)they would be better off…

        Next time they get pushed around by Schumacher and Alonso, they need to start getting tough.

        “Fernando… have you ever seen the movie City of God?”

        That’ll work.

    5. Nice.

      Alternatively a three-car team so he can race both Felipe and his brother. ;)

  9. Who do Luca wants to sit in the third car? He is mad & he had a three car disease.But I liked what he said about new circuit,it’s better that he push FIA to work more on that.

  10. GREAT Gala vid…!!!!

  11. Richard Williams (whose articles I usually find obtuse) wrote a bit on the subject of team orders, the crux was thus:

    Formula One’s higher visibility, and the preponderance of recently converted fans, means it has recently been judged by inapplicable standards.

    Here’s an unrelated question:

    Looking back at his rookie season if Kamui Kobayashi was British would the prevailing opinion of him be any different and if so how?

    1. They’d compare him to Senna, and persistent over the top journalism would have him rumoured to be taking Massa’s seat.

  12. Is steph90 Steph’s spy alter-ego?

    Have a happy birthday “for sure”!

    1. Don’t reveal my secret spy id :P I just got bored and decided to drop the 90 so sorry for any confusion!

  13. happy birthday steph! would your ideal present be Massa winning the WDC? :)

    1. Thank you Sato and in a word: yes! :D

  14. Is it just me, or is that video the cheesiest thing that has ever been made? It’s like they took all that is bad about the officail race edits (sappy music, barrage of half-second shots, gratuitous supposed ‘babes’, gratuitous star sightings, moronic faces made by ‘fans’, etc, etc). Somewhat less painful half way through with the inclusion of Motorhead in the soundtrack for the more action-y stuff and the poke at team orders, but the whole preposterous narration of the intro (narrator-type in semi-Shakespearian, semi-sports-macho baritone: F1 Drivers Are The Most Glorious Beings To Ever Have Touched The Mortal Plain. Be In Awe, little humans) and pretty much every single thing about is ridiculous. Did I mention I didn’t quite like it?

    1. I LOVE the intro – best ever. This is a sport that knows when to look back. Westlife and Take That were a bit cheeky. But overall, a solid video. Not the all-time best for me, but one of the better ones.

      1. Seems to have been done by the same people who did the original BBC “Scream of Science” F1 return intro in 2009.

        BBC – The Scream Of Science

    2. I have to sat the part about team orders made me laugh out loud, which a video has not made me do in quite a while.

  15. The football analogy is good but maybe Monte didnt mean it this way:

    In football, when uneven financial power leads to abuse then the regulators take action, limiting squad sizes and number of non EU players plus clubs like Man City spending 107% of turnover on wages has led FIFA to limit overall wage bill against turnover from 2013.

    F1 had all the same issues, qually engines, big test teams, huge numbers of software engineers, 2 wind tunnels on 24/7 and so on. It had to change! There will always be flaws in any regs but overall it should be more about racing more than it is about empiricial technical advances.

    Of course Monte complains, im sure Man City will complain but their way, as someone said, is only correct if you believe there is no tomorrow.

  16. too bad luca. Lotus will have 4 cars on the grid next year

    1. Ha! Excellent point.

  17. Many happy returns Steph and Magnificent Geoffrey, that has to be COTD!

    Nathan

  18. Happy brithday Steph

    And a great COTD too!

    The three car thing is really getting old – I suppose the people actually doing the work asked de Montezemelo to stay out of their factory over the winter, so he is forced to dredge up old opinions again, especially since, with Berlusconi surviving as prime minister, his political career will have to wait.

    On Genii’s view on Lotus Renault: if you are not claiming the Team Lotus legacy, how about leaving the black and gold livery behind then? Bit puzzling.

    Or is he maybe trying to twist it such that neither deserves the legacy, thus the car manufacturer Group Lotus wins. In which case, why does he think that “Group” has attempted to get the Team Lotus name/legacy, unsuccessfully, several times over the last years, but still does claim the racing legacy in their headquarters. Doesn’t that sort of dispute that non of them is claiming it?

  19. well its not going to happen so…..?

    hay what if HRT got control of F1, or Skoda or Postman Pat!!!! responses to “flights of fancy competition,

  20. Luca di Montezemolo actual makes some very good points for a change (possibly the 1st time ever) **wide eyes**

  21. Luca di Montezemolo repeats his demand F1 for three-car teams in Formula 1.

    Demand? Insane

    “On the subject of the new circuits, I have to say it would be better if more thought was given to the races with an increase in overtaking opportunities with less effort going into beautiful architecture.

    Spot on!

    “Then we must unblock this absurd limitation on testing. Formula 1 is the only sport in which there is no chance to train. It is like asking Real Madrid, Milan or Inter to play with smooth soled boots in the rain or not to warm up before a Champions League game.”

    Spot on again!

    2 outta 3 ain’t so bad for Luca :D

  22. Happy B’day to a fellow Scuderia Ferrari fan and F1 Fanatic! Having a pint called Steph to honor this glorious day.

    Cheers! Alex

    1. I’ve never had a pint named after me before so thank you :P I insist you have more than one though ;)

  23. That FIA video was awesome.

  24. Enzo would fire his ass. Asap. By saying: was these comments made by LDM´s brother??

  25. Come on Luca, Felipe was not good enough for you so you need other no. 2 driver?

  26. Bortolotti ans Zampieri out of the FDA
    As I said yesterday many drivers of the FDA really prove to be a fail.

  27. On this day in F1
    Clay Regazzoni died this day 4 years ago.

  28. Three car teams. Tasty prospect. But not practical. Because for tracks that would need pitlane extensions, who’s gonna pay for all of them?

  29. Testing – totally agree, is crazy. Should allow more testing – but still limited. The Monday idea sounds good.

  30. So if three cars were deployed by each team in the future, We will probably listen: “Fernando is faster than you TWO”!!!!!!!!!

  31. that man just doesn’t seem to understand te meaning of the word No, wich i thought was simple.

  32. There are offcourse pro’s and con’s for running 3 cars per team.

    One of the biggest pro’s would offcourse be that there would theoreticly be more more competative cars on the grid. However this is also a double edged sword if you ask me, what is to stop lets say HRT from getting a thrid car and hiring it out on a race by race basis to various pay drivers?

    One of the biggest con’s would be that the smaller and midfield teams would struggle even more to get points, and therefor a smaller portion of the end of year pay outs.

    However I have always thought that there would be an easy compromise to this. What if, when a team enters or is in F1, the FIA says it has to run two cars, but has the option to sell/rent out the rights to one of their grid slots to another team….

    This would allow bigger teams like ferrari or Mclaren to run a third car, which the would pay a smaller team for, which in turn has more money to focuus on just the one car, so fewer costs as well. This would allow them theoreticly to built a more competative car, as they now have more money and can spend their recources on develloping and maintaning just one car.

    The big teams , although they have bigger budgets, do net have unlimited budgets, so this option would cost them a chunk of money. and would therefor potentially mean the can develop their car slightly less, also because they would have 3 different drivers with presumably different drivingstyles, so it would be tougher to make a car that suits them all.

    This would in my oppinion bring the teams closer together in terms of speed. And luca can have what he wants :P

    This would work even better if a budgetcap was introduced, but still works well under the recource restriction agreement currently in place..

    thoughts?

    Con

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