The awaited F1 Commission meeting took place over the weekend of the Austrian GP. The main topic of discussion for the top managers of the various teams, as well as for the FIA and F1, was above all the much talked about topic of the budget cap. The ceiling on the expenses allowed to each team over the course of a season is now fully operational and, for the 2022 season, was originally set at an altitude 140 million dollars. The outbreak of the war in Ukraine, unleashed by the Russian army starting from February 24, however, caused strong economic and financial repercussions around the world, generating an increase in energy costs and also a surge in inflation.
These consequences have also inevitably affected the world of motorsport and especially the international category par excellence, Formula 1. Many teams, especially the top teams, complained during the first part of the championship. exaggerated increase in their fixed costs. This, according to them, would have required an upward revision of the spending ceiling to prevent many of them from being ‘outlawed’. The smaller teams, on the other hand, expressed the opposite opinion, for which an increase in the budget cap would have represented a further tool for opening the performance gap with the top of the grid.
Eventually in Austria the teams came to a synthesis, approving a 3.1% increase in the budget cap precisely to cope with the growth of inflation. A compromise solution which, however, as often happens in these cases, does not seem to have satisfied anyone. The Mercedes team principal, Toto Wolff, he was skeptical right from the start. His colleague from the McLaren team, Andreas Seidlhas highlighted how his team and other teams are concretely at risk breaking the roof well before the last GP of the season. A cry of alarm that will probably also be picked up by other Circus bosses in the coming weeks.
“I think six or seven teams could go over the limit – Seidl told the site Motorsport-Total – which would have the consequence that – depending on how high this overshoot is – it would be a violation of the regulation and there would be related sanctions. I don’t want to give a figure, but it would be considerable – added the German manager when asked how big the McLaren overrun would be – because there have been unexpected, gigantic cost increases that have nothing to do with normal inflation. Especially with regards to transportation and electricity bills, which were not predictable“, He concluded.
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