This is an update to:
Economic Crisis Heats Up The ‘F1 Engines’ War
Formula One is being stifled by a lack of innovation and needs a radical overhaul to withstand the global credit crunch, motor racing head Max Mosley said on Wednesday.
“We need dramatically to cut costs and get innovation back into Formula One,” the head of the governing International Automobile Federation (FIA) said.
“We must stabilize the system with a base engine which anyone can have and which is inexpensive, as well as a standard gearbox. That will stabilize Formula One until we can bring in new energy-efficient engines which undoubtedly will be the future.”
Mosley has also been a strong supporter of the KERS system, due to be introduced next season, which captures energy generated under braking and transforms it into short bursts of additional power.
Some teams have called for the system to be delayed, while others have said they will start the season without it.
Mosley said the response from manufacturers was widely divergent.
“What is wrong with Formula One today was wrong before any of the present economic problems cropped up. Essentially it’s the rules, which have become ever more restrictive compressing the work of the engineers into an ever smaller area,” Mosley said.
“We’ve finally found a serious engineering challenge for the teams in KERS,” Mosley said. “Some manufacturers have risen to this challenge . . . but some leading teams, such as Ferrari, have said that they don’t like KERS because it is ‘too complicated.’ Could you imagine the great F1 engineers like (Lotus founder Colin) Chapman or (Cosworth co-founder Keith) Duckworth saying, ‘I can’t do that because it is too complicated?”’
“Success in Formula One today consists of optimising each little bit of the chassis, which is ever more costly and completely absurd,” Mosley said in addressing the opening day of the Motor Sport Business Forum.
By way of example Mosley pointed out: “A Formula One team spends 1,000 dollars for a special wheel nut imported from California and uses 1,000 per season, so that produces an overall bill of a million dollars a year.”
He added that the constant search for new, lighter materials “has created a mentality in Formula One which forces the engineers to refine as opposed to innovate and that is slowly destroying Formula One.
“It’s all very expensive and that’s not really an engineer’s mission.”
UPDATE: December 12, 2008 06:47 am
Formula One world champion Lewis Hamilton is against FIA president Max Mosley’s idea of using a standardized engine for all F1 cars.
Mosley has called for the introduction of a low-cost Cosworth engine from the 2010 season as part of cost-cutting measures being discussed with the teams. The FIA World Motor Sport Council will be voting on the proposals Friday in Monte Carlo, Monaco.
“I don’t think that’s going to happen. Formula One is a manufactured sport and you won’t have Formula One without the manufacturers,” Hamilton said Thursday. “What are you going to do? I can’t imagine it (Formula One) ever being without Ferrari, without Mercedes Benz, without Renault.
Hamilton realises there is a need for cost-cutting in the current global downturn, but feels F1 will survive.
He also had words of support for Honda, who are seeking a new buyer for their F1 team, and for Honda driver Jenson Button.
“I know Jenson very well and I feel for him. I can imagine how he feels and I send my best wishes to him and his family,” said Hamilton, speaking after teaming up with former world champion Mika Hakkinen to drive black cabs in London as part of the Johnnie Walker anti-drink drive campaign.
“But he is a world class racing driver and I have no doubt in my mind that he will remain in F1 because there are not that many divers out there of his calibre.”
Hamilton, who has a US$111-million, five-year contract with McLaren, recognizes that F1 must cut back on escalating costs.
Formula One Teams Association chairman Luca di Montezemolo said Thursday that drastic cost-cutting will create a new-look sport by 2012 with funding levels from the 1990s.
“The world is struggling but they are always taking the right actions to make the sport cheaper,” Hamilton said. “But every time they introduce something new, it costs more money so it’s about having a balance.
“They are doing the best job they can to be more cost effective - and I’m supportive of that.”
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