Ferrari threatens to quit over budget cap dispute
Ferrari has warned that it could quit Formula 1 over the current dispute about the 2021 budget cap.
The Maranello team is the loudest and clearest objector to efforts to drive the headline figure from $175 million next year down to as low as $100m amid the global pandemic.
"The $145m level is already a new and demanding request compared to what was set out last June," Ferrari boss Mattia Binotto told the Guardian.
"It cannot be attained without further significant sacrifices, especially in terms of our human resources.
"If it was to get even lower, we would not want to be put in a position of having to look at other further options for deploying our racing DNA," he added.
He also worries that limiting F1's financial and technological power risks bringing the sport "ever closer to the lower formulae".
Binotto has argued that because every team is different, "it is not simple and straightforward to make structural changes simply by cutting costs in a linear fashion".
"We are well aware that F1 and indeed the whole world right now is going through a particularly difficult time because of the pandemic," he said.
"However, this is not the time to react in a hurry as there's a risk of making decisions on the back of this emergency without clearly evaluating all the consequences."
Binotto also agrees with Red Bull's Christian Horner that a better solution might be to allow the sale of 'customer cars' to smaller teams.
"If the current emergency really put the existence of some of our competitors in this sport in doubt and made it necessary to revise certain cornerstones, then Ferrari would be open to it," he said.
"It's not even sacrilegious, given it's happened before in F1 and happens today in series such as MotoGP."
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Their threatening to quit ???? ? They’ve never said that before #sarcasm
Yeah, $100m isn't enough. We need a bigger paddock mansion and to pay a 18 yr old kid $50m to have fun driving a racecar Sheesh, it wasn't long ago that a competitive team would spend $10-15m per season, and that seemed excessive. Here is an idea...tell the OEM's to go race WEC. Write reasonable rules and tell teams to abide by them or take a hike.
Screw Ferrari. Whenever they can't get their way, like 3-year old children, they throw a tantrum and threaten to "take their ball home with them".
"Bye then!" Self-interest again. Why oh why is F1 becoming so frickin' boring? The only good thing in those comments was Binotto agreeing with Horner over the sale of 'customer cars' to smaller teams. I say it again and again, please, please scrap the rule that says all teams must predominantly build their own cars to race in F1. It was a Bernie idea that NEVER made any sense to racing fans - the lifeblood of any motor sport!! Let's get back to 70's and 80's racing with modern technology and have multiple teams and cars all racing on an affordable budget and give more drivers the chance to race in F1 and show us what they can do. The cream will rise to the top and it will stop great lower category drivers missing out through lack of available seats and opportunities or a lack of budget! Just imagine the drama of pre-qualifying (eg for all new entries) if there are more than 13 teams and allow a full grid of 26 cars to start the race.
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