Rob Widdows and I sit down again to discuss the latest news from the world of motor sport. CVC may be selling the rights to Formula 1, Rupert Murdoch and others may be buying them, Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo is threatening to form a breakaway series again and the Formula 1 teams want a larger slice of the action. What, if anything, is going on?

The week in motor sport

As well as putting Rob on the spot about the current political situation in F1, we chat about the forthcoming Spanish Grand Prix and the MotoGP race in France.

We hope you enjoy it. As always, let us know your thoughts.

Next week we will be taking ‘the question of the week’ on the show so anything you want to ask Rob (within reason) please post below…

Click here to view the embedded video.

Or, if you’d like to download it…

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

FOTA has reacted to the FIA World Council’s tough new measures to force cost cuts in Formula 1. The governing body has rejected FOTA’s proposal of the 12-9-7-5-4-3-2-1 points system in favour of awarding medals for race wins to ensure the driver who wins the most races becomes World Champion.

The FIA has also announced plans for a two-tier system in 2010 where the teams can choose to run to a budget cap of £30m and a more open rule book or choose to spend more and run to the current regulations. Unsurprisingly FOTA has responded coolly to the World Council’s ruling. Chairman Luca Di Montezemolo said:

“With regard to the decisions taken today by the FIA World Council, FOTA would like to express its disappointment and concern at the fact that these have been taken in a unilateral manner. The framework of the regulations as defined by the FIA, to be applicable as from 2010, runs the risk of turning on its head the very essence of Formula 1 and the principles that make it one of the most popular and appealing sports.

“Given the timeframe and the way in which these modifications were decided upon, we feel it is necessary to study closely the new situation and to do everything, especially in these difficult times, to maintain a stable framework for the regulations without continuous upheaval, that can be perplexing and confusing for car manufacturers, teams, the public and sponsors.”

It appears the gloves are off between FOTA and the FIA.

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

On March 5, in Geneva, FOTA – Formula One Teams Association – had its inaugural press conference, and my immediate impression was to feel a touch underwhelmed. Luca di Montezemolo, the association’s president, was at his most patrician as he addressed the audience, but if we had been expecting a bombshell announcement of any kind, it never came.

There was plenty of emphasis on the teams’ new-found togetherness, of the need to work with the FIA and with Bernie Ecclestone on the future of the sport, and so on, and a great deal of time was given over to the need for cost-cutting. By 2010, Montezemolo said, the cost of Formula 1 – in terms of a team’s expenditure – would be 50 per cent of what it was in 2008, a remarkable achievement in itself.

There was also pleasing evidence that at long last F1 has examined what Flavio Briatore calls ‘the product’, and concluded it needs to become more ‘fan friendly’, both on the track and off it. There is, for example, a proposal that pit-to-car radio transmissions be made available to broadcasters – quite something for a society normally given to Masonic secrecy.

There were plenty of suggestions and ideas, and it was all very politically correct, but when you looked a little more deeply into what had been said – and, more to the point, what had not been said – a more significant picture began to emerge. Yes, Montezemolo had said that all parties were likely to sign a new Concorde Agreement in the near future, which concerns the ‘commercial arrangements’ – 50 per cent of the monies from race organisers, TV companies, and so on, going to the teams, and 50 per cent to Formula One Management (Ecclestone) – but this will take us only up to 2012. And if you listened closely to Luca, you concluded that thereafter the teams will require a significantly larger slice of the financial cake.

Whether some or all of FOTA’s proposals will be adopted by the FIA remains to be seen, but clearly the teams – unified as they have never been before – will have a stronger voice in future. Mindful of what happened to CART, they do not want to run the sport themselves – but nor do they wish any longer to be pushed around.

As one team principal said afterwards, “We don’t want to make the rules, but we do want to have some say in them. And, given that we’re all together now, we do have the facility to vote with our feet…”

Go on, I said. “Well, for example, take refuelling. Most of us never wanted it in the first place, because it’s expensive to lug all that stuff across the world, it’s an unnecessary danger, and it adds nothing to the show. Yes, it’s going to be banned in 2010 anyway, but if that weren’t the case, we could simply not take the refuelling equipment with us, couldn’t we? I’m sure they would still want us to race…”

On the surface, then, a commitment to work with the FIA and FOM, and I’m sure that’s what all in FOTA would prefer. Under the surface, though, is a message, polite in expression, but resolute in tone: the days of ‘divide and rule’, as perfected by Mosley and Ecclestone down the years, are over. Interesting times, one feels, lie ahead.

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine