We all know that you are anti-Ferrari/Italian, but my question is why? Is it solely because you are British?

Marco Cimmarusti

Dear Marco,

Forgive me, but I’m astounded that you should think me anti-Ferrari or, for that matter, anti-Italy. I’ve often said, half-jokingly, that if you didn’t need a passport to go to Italy, France or the USA, I’d be quite happy to do without one. I adore Italy, and always have.

For that matter, in my childhood, when all my friends were Lotus or BRM fans, I was always obsessively pro-Ferrari, and those who drove for the team. The romance and the magic of the name captivated me – nothing ever looked or sounded like a Ferrari.

All that said, I will admit that my feelings were diluted somewhat through the era just past, when Ferrari lost much of the ‘Italian’ ingredient that had always made it so appealing. Much as I have always admired Michael Schumacher the driver – how could anyone not? – I was never a fan, because I still happen to believe that ethics are important in sport, and I thought many of Schumacher’s actions contemptible.

So, yes, I’ll admit that I didn’t greatly enjoy that period when Michael and Ferrari were winning everything – apart from anything else, it got pretty boring to go off to the airport every couple of weeks, knowing before you left what you were going to see at Monaco, Spa, Monza or wherever.

More than anything, though, I disliked the fact that, on far too many occasions, Ferrari was singled out for ‘special treatment’. Time after time I listened to other team principals and drivers complain about there being ‘one law for Ferrari, and one for the rest of us’. You could hardly blame them, either – indeed, not long before he left office as FIA president, Max Mosley blithely admitted that Ferrari had been effectively granted the right of veto over technical regulations in F1. How could that ever be right?

These days, however, with Stefano Domenicali at the helm, Ferrari is much more like Ferrari again, and I’m delighted to see it. And a final thought, Marco: I’ve always said that if I were able to go to only one race a year, it would be Monza…

I am afraid we’ve had to cancel our podcast that was scheduled for June 11th. However, you’ll be pleased to know that it is for a very good reason: we have a guest coming in to talk to us in a couple of weeks. We won’t say who he is just yet, but rest assured that there will be plenty of questions you’ll want to ask him.

While the rule changes were made under the charge of Max Mosley, and it’s maybe to early to judge Jean Todt, has Formula 1 and the FIA missed the point? All fans know what makes for an exciting race. Take the 2008 Belgian GP with Hamilton and Räikkönen going wheel to wheel for the final few laps.

I’m no engineer, but obvious improvements should be wider circuits, manual gearboxes, harder tyres and steel brakes. Maybe a return to a few ‘proper’ circuits as well…
Andy Geering

Dear Andy,
I’ll admit that I did feel a little depressed when I left Bahrain – we had all gone there with such high expectations, but the race was indeed a stone drag, quite devoid of racing.

However, there were good reasons why probably it was always going to turn out that way. This was the first race run under the new ‘no refuelling’ rule, and, for all their simulation work, the teams did not really know what to expect – particularly in terms of tyre wear (especially the softer of the two Bridgestone compounds on offer). The attitude of everyone was therefore conservative and cautious – and this at a track already notorious as a ‘no overtaking’ zone. On reflection, then, perhaps we shouldn’t have been surprised that the race turned out to be a damp squib.

Since Bahrain, however, I’m sure you’ll agree that things have picked up somewhat. I’ll agree that we have been lucky that rain featured in two of the three races, but I think Melbourne was an exceptional race, Shanghai a very good one, and Sepang not bad, either, given that the track was dry throughout.

It’s a fact, however, that we can’t rely on the elements to provide entertaining Grands Prix. The European season is about to get underway, and, while there may be odd wet races, the likelihood is that the great majority will be dry. As I’ve said ’til I’m weary of saying it, the powers-that-be have got to make really fundamental changes to the rules concerning aerodynamics – until one car is able very closely to follow another through a corner, overtaking will remain an endangered species in F1. No one is suggesting that passing should be easy – this is Grand Prix racing, after all – but certainly it should not be as difficult as it has been for the last 15 or 20 years.

Your points about wider circuits, manual gearboxes and steel brakes are all valid, but… where, in these depressed economic circumstances, does the money come from to widen circuits (save perhaps those in places where there is plenty of government cash, but pretty well zero local interest)? Mention manual gearboxes, and team owners shudder at the thought of all those missed shifts, and consequent costly engine blow-ups. Steel brakes, though, would be an excellent change.

As for your last point about a return to a few ‘proper circuits’, I’m afraid I can only say, ‘Dream on…’ We’ve still got Spa and Monza and Silverstone and Suzuka, while Monaco remains a great test of driving ability, but as Bernie casts his eye ever more eastwards, the likelihood is that new ‘autodromes’ will have an ever-bigger part to play in the World Championship…

Many immediately suggested it had been a mistake to get rid of refuelling and demanded immediate changes, some of which had merit, some not. Bernie Ecclestone counselled against knee-jerk reactions, and anyone with half a brain agreed with him.

Race two, in Melbourne, was as diverting as Bahrain had been bland, and much of this – rightly – was put down to uncertain weather conditions, which have spawned exciting races since the beginning of time. It isn’t much of an intellectual stretch to understand that when you get a wet race track – even a damp one – you have less grip, and when you have less grip you get more driving errors and therefore changes in the order.

Not rocket science, is it? Which makes it the more unbelievable that, between them, the FIA and the Formula 1 teams – all of which have recently wakened up to the fact that racing fans like racing – cannot between them come up with a set of regulations to promote it. Last year, those teams which designed ‘trick’ double-diffusers into the concept of their cars deliberately ignored the aims of the FIA Overtaking Working Group – and the governing body then shamefully declared them permissible.

All concerned knew of the adverse effect this would have on the sport’s appeal, and all – for reasons of self-interest – chose to ignore it. A plague on their houses, as far as I’m concerned – but the FIA Court of Appeal stands especially culpable, for while it is in the DNA of F1 designers to look for loopholes in the rules, it is the interests of the sport which should always be paramount to the people who run it.

Patrick Head once pointed out that the Monaco Grand Prix would be highly diverting if all the cars ran with ‘Hockenheim wing settings’, and on another occasion even more radically suggested that wings be banned altogether – although that, he smilingly admitted, would never be accepted by the team owners given the amount of ‘sponsorship area’ on the car that would be lost.

For the fans, the people to whom manufacturers and sponsors are trying to sell things – and therefore, in the end, the people who pay for this sport – what constitutes the ideal racing car? No one ever defined that better than Tony Brooks, the great Vanwall and Ferrari driver of half a century ago: “A Grand Prix car,” he said, “should always have slightly more power than the chassis can comfortably handle…”

Simple, isn’t it? And the abiding problem of contemporary F1 is that the ratio between power and grip is out of kilter. The ban on traction control was a good move, but still the fact remains that F1 cars race today with 300 horsepower fewer than we have seen in the past – and don’t tell me that the grip levels in the 1980s (during the turbo era) were anything like those of today.

Some years ago Max Mosley decided that horsepower was getting out of control, and declared that the 3-litre V10 engine should be replaced by a 2.4-litre V8. He then imposed the ‘frozen engine spec’ rule, and that was probably essential, given the amounts of money being spent on the endless quest for another 10bhp.

Unfortunately, attempts to change the aerodynamic rules – so as to cut back on grip – have proved far less effective, and thus we have a situation where a dry day means a procession, where only adverse weather conditions can guarantee a memorable afternoon. Can’t be right.

After Bahrain, there was hand-wringing by some of the team principals, who had apparently become suddenly aware that a Grand Prix can be boring, and were demanding all manner of instant changes to spice up ‘The Show’. One instant change might be to be receptive in future to technical changes proposed by the Overtaking Working Group, rather than ignore them for the sake of self-interest.

And to think there was a time when we used to joke about spinklers…

1950s
At the start of the World Championship the Italians ruled, but then came the rise of the Brits

1960s
A decade of technical innovation, with rear-engined cars coming to the fore, led by Lotus and Jim Clark

1970s
The ’60s had been a deadly era, but this was no better, until Jackie Stewart started his campaign for safety

1980s
The struggle for power between the teams and FOCA reaches a head, and is repeated by Senna and Prost

1990s
A black weekend for F1 with the death of Senna, followed by the rise of Schumacher (and Max and Bernie)

2000s
Schuey continues his red rule, before a new generation bring the excitement back to Formula 1 racing

Bahrain celebration
Nearly every living World Champion was at the first race of the season to mark 60 years of F1

Other features

Lunch with… Riccardo Patrese
His mother wanted him to study, not go racing. Luckily for us he defied her…

Road test: Rolls-Royce Ghost
More affordable Rolls impresses

Classic Racing Cars
’80s tin-tip legend and a must-have for wideboys – the Ford Sierra Cosworth

Dear Nigel,
Am I alone in being a little disappointed with the first Grand Prix of 2010? Despite a formidable line-up of driver talent, F1 now seems to consist of a short sprint (qualifying) followed by a boring two-hour reliability trial. I suppose the very high standard across the leading teams makes this inevitable, but it does make for a poor entertainment. Surely the answer lies in a radical rethink of the formula: loads of power, ZERO downforce, a limit on minimum drag and minimal electronic driver aids. F1 is a highly promoted bad concept; if it continues down its current path, we’ll all be watching the bikes! What do you think?
Roger Tushingham

Next month we’re joined by 1978 Formula 1 World Champion Mario Andretti so make sure you ask him a question here!

Also make sure you give us your feedback below as it’s all very well us enjoying recording these, but if you don’t enjoy listening to them, then we aren’t doing a very good job…

If you don’t use iTunes then do use the following link: http://podcast.motorsportmagazine.co.uk/2010/01/January2010podcast.mp3

Vatanen, one of the great rally drivers (World Champion in 1981), is a popular and well-respected man in the motor sport world, and already a trustee of the FIA Foundation. As well as that, he was an MEP for 10 years (standing down this year), and thus has experience of real-world politics, rather than the ersatz variety so relished in the Place de la Concorde. Vatanen is, as one F1 team principal put it, ‘a proper bloke’. He is also one who genuinely loves this sport – and that in itself would be a breakthrough after what we have been through in the last 18 years.

Apart from Vatanen, there appear to be two names on the table at the moment, and it’s fair to say that neither would be welcomed by the F1 community. Max Mosley, having held the post of president of the FIA since 1991, announced on June 24 that he would not stand for re-election in the autumn, then said on June 25 that perhaps – in light of horrid things said about him by those common FOTA tykes – he might do so, after all. Luca di Montezemolo, Mosley said, had given to the press an impression that he had been ousted. The very idea

Does Mosley really intend to stand again? Or is this all an elaborate preparation for sliding into office his preferred successor, one Jean Todt? No one – on the outside, anyway – has a clue, and, quite honestly, most are losing interest by the day. At Silverstone Bernie Ecclestone was told – in words of one syllable – by F1 luminaries that they were no longer prepared to work with Mosley, and it’s clear they have no wish to work with Todt, either.

If FOTA is to continue to operate within the framework of the FIA, and compete for the F1 World Championship in 2010 and beyond, its favoured choice for FIA president is emphatically Vatanen, a man it feels may be trusted. The teams, though, have no direct say in who shall be in the job.

In 2005, immediately before Mosley won yet another term as president, a ‘cabinet system’ was introduced at the FIA. What this means is that anyone aspiring to the presidency must accompany his application with a list of 22 names of folk within the FIA offering support for his candidacy. This is his ‘cabinet’.

None of the names in one person’s ‘cabinet’, however, may appear in another candidate’s list. Thus, the most powerful – and the best connected – candidates are likely to collar the bulk of the most influential FIA figures. Beginning to get the picture?

Not really a surprise that many FOTA team principals devoutly wish for a clean break from Max, the FIA, Bernie, CVC and the whole damn thing, is it? A ‘breakaway championship’? Bring it on, say I – unless somehow a man like Vatanen can find his way to the top floor in the Place de la Concorde, open the windows, and let in a little fresh air.

Difficult to know what to say about this. On the one hand, one might suggest that at a time when the majority of the population is suffering greatly at the hand of G Brown and Bankers Inc, it isn’t necessarily the easiest moment in which to find much sympathy for a profession in which most folk are, let’s say, well rewarded. It’s one thing, after all, for the hierarchy of RBS, HBOS and the rest to point out that they personally have lost money on the value of their shares, leaving them with fewer millions to see them through; quite another for Mr and Mrs Average to have lost everything.

There are exceptions to the rule, of course, but it is a standing joke in racing circles that if F1 drivers are adept at demanding huge sums of money, they are even better at keeping it; ’twas ever thus.

That said, however, the rise in the price of a superlicence proposed by the FIA is simply staggering. In 2008 it cost 1725 euros, plus 456 euros per point scored the previous year. Thus Kimi Räikkönen, the ’07 World Champion with 110 points, will have paid 51,885 euros for his ’08 licence, a not inconsiderable sum to most people, but one which will have made little dent in Kimi’s rumoured Ferrari retainer of $40m.

Last year Räikkönen scored but 75 points – but the bill for his 2009 licence will be rather greater: 160,000 euros. Max Mosley has decided that the price of a licence should now be 10,000 euros, plus 2000 euros per point. Lewis Hamilton’s will come out at a cool 206,000 euros…

In absolute terms, these sums are small change to such as Hamilton and Räikkönen, but not all Grand Prix drivers are paid like city traders. Felipe Massa, for example, earns a smallish fraction of Räikkönen’s retainer, yet his licence will cost him a great deal more than Kimi, because he scored many more points last year.
Let’s not worry too much for Felipe, however, for he is still very well rewarded by Ferrari. A driver like Timo Glock is a different matter, however. He was an F1 rookie last year, and is not in the big money league, yet he scored 25 points, and will thus have to fork out 60,000 euros if he wants to go racing this year. No surprise that Timo is not too thrilled.

As I say, at a time like this I’m not suggesting we should waste too many tears on the drivers’ Superlicence fees, but the scale of the increase does seem a touch extreme, even by Mosley standards. Max justifies it by pointing out that the FIA ‘spends a fortune on safety, and it is for the benefit of the drivers’. True enough, but this has been the case for countless years (as is also true of telephone-number retainers), so why the sudden leap in licence fees now? A portion of the $100,000,000 fine meted out to McLaren in 2007 must surely, after all, have gone some way towards improving safety.

Still, private jets etc are pricey, and the governing body is expensive to run. The drivers have duly voiced their dissatisfaction with the increase in fees, and Mosley has reacted in the conciliatory manner which has marked his whole career: anyone who hasn’t forked out for his new licence by the time of the Australian Grand Prix will not be on the grid.

Some have cynically suggested that safety costs may indeed go up this year, thanks to the advent of KERS. “That’s something else,” one driver murmured, “that only Max is in favour of…”

Happy days in Formula 1, then. In NASCAR, where many drivers make mega-bucks, the cost of a licence comes out at $4000…

But it may not be Christmas and New Year revelling that finds you in this condition. Getting back to work is never easy, especially when the world around us appears to be in such turmoil. And the little world of motor racing has not escaped what may turn out to be some kind of watershed in our times.

Grand Prix teams – and freelance writers – do not have a fortnight’s holiday for Christmas even when the season starts a little later, as it does this year. There are new cars to be built, new sponsors to be charmed and existing ones to be reassured. Not easy this year. In both cases.

Talking to Ian Phillips (above) at Force India, you get it straight from the hip. “There will always be new sponsors,” he says, “but right now they are going to have to be mighty brave.” He should know, having survived four decades with, among others, Jordan, Midland, Spyker and now Force India. These are not comfortable times for a bank, or a car manufacturer, to justify a major partnership to its shareholders.

Costs are coming down, however, and not before time. Sir Jackie Stewart is right when he says that Formula 1 should have been preparing itself for leaner times way before the current economic woes became headlines. He is also right when he suggests that the FIA should, following the reign of Max Mosley, have a president from outside the motor racing business. It would, he argues, be a healthier and more efficient alternative to the tightly held and claustrophobic kingdom to which we have become accustomed.

What really matters to people like us are the cars. And, of course, the racing. So what can we expect from the 2009 season? Predictions, especially about the future, are always to be taken with a pinch of salt but there are some indicators.

Firstly, KERS might be a mighty flop, a white elephant rather than an engineering miracle. This rather depends on who you are talking to, as is ever the case. BMW has spent a great deal of time and money on developing its own system, sacrificing some development of the 2008 car to do so. But there are many in Munich who fear that KERS may be either postponed or, at worst, put back on the shelf. Unlikely, but there are vague murmurs that the mighty Scuderia is not as far advanced as it might be and may even consider asking the FIA for some kind of postponement. Again unlikely, but millions of euros have been spent, especially in Munich, and it is not preposterous to suggest that whoever has the best system in Melbourne may just run away with the first few races. For many teams, dealing with new aerodynamics, slick tyres and less testing is more than enough, without the extra anxieties of an energy recovery system.

Christian Horner, the boss at Red Bull, says that a few teams will have KERS on the cars in Melbourne but, in his view, the advantage of extra power may not prove to be worth the extra weight and complexity of the various systems. As with any other new component on a racing car, these new KERS systems – which are not mandatory – will only be run in race trim if the evidence is there on the stopwatch.

Meanwhile Happy New Year everyone! Try watching Pink Panther films instead of the news bulletins. You will feel a whole lot less ramfeezled.

Bernie grinned. “I think we’d better leave it like that. It’s a good place to finish, isn’t it?”

Over the weekend of the Canadian Grand Prix, paddock chat suggested that, while their fundamental friendship remained, the two men had fallen out professionally, and in a big way. True or not? I asked Ecclestone about the current state of affairs.

“It’s very simple,” he said. “There was no problem until this whole business with Max was reported, but now all the chief executives of the big companies involved in F1 are saying that… perhaps he shouldn’t be the president of the FIA. And the teams are saying that, too. I’m in the middle, really. I have no problem with Max personally. He was a mate of mine before this all this came up, and he’s a mate of mine still.”

Ecclestone was in New York on June 3, the day of the FIA General Assembly vote (to decide whether or not Mosley should remain in office), and in Montréal, five days later, I was told by an FIA man that so livid was Mosley with Ecclestone that there had been no contact between them since – indeed, he said, Max had declined to take Bernie’s calls. Was that true? “Yes,” said Ecclestone. “Absolutely true. I’ve had no discussions with him since the vote.”

I confess that, since the start of this whole affair, I believed Ecclestone’s role in deciding Mosley’s future was pivotal, in the sense that I thought Max would only go when Bernie told him the game was up. Very late in the day – some would say too late – he finally gave an interview, in which he implored him to resign before the vote.

1977 French Grand Prix, Dijon-Prenois, France. Then owner of Brabham, Ecclestone, has a chat with the March Engineering team manager, Mosley.

So have the two men really fallen out this time, or is it merely what they wish us to believe because they’re working to an agenda, and it suits their purpose? There’s no doubt that fundamental differences exist in their ideas about the content of the next Concorde Agreement, but – maybe I’m wrong – still it’s mighty difficult for me to believe that their legendary ‘double act’ has been seriously compromised.

We live in interesting times, as Mosley is fond of saying. And potentially very damaging times for Formula 1. Watch this space, as they say.