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FIA & FOTA reach agreement to save F1, boot Max in October

Well that was a short war.  Cooler heads have prevailed in the shortest split in auto racing to save F1.  The FIA announced this morning that they have come to an agreement to bring the FOTA teams back in the fold with plans to phase in cost reductions over the next couple of years.  But that’s not all.  As part of the agreement, Max Mosely will not stand for re-election of his position this fall.

While I’m sure that certain track promoters are disappointed today, this resolution is probably the best case scenario for everyone.  F1 stays intact, and Max is out the door.

UK Whitney Gazette:  Formula One row settled

Here is an official statement from the FIA.

FIA STATEMENT 6/24/2009

All currently competing teams have committed to the FIA Formula One World Championship.

There will be no alternative series or Championship and the rules for 2010 onwards will be the 2009 regulations as well as further regulations agreed prior to 29 April 2009.

As part of this agreement, the teams will, within two years, reduce the costs of competing in the Championship to the level of the early 1990s. The manufacturer teams have agreed to assist the new entries for 2010 by providing technical assistance.

The manufacturer teams have further agreed to the permanent and continuing role of the FIA as the sport’s governing body. They have also committed to the commercial arrangements for the FIA Formula One World Championship until 2012 and have agreed to renegotiate and extend this contract before the end of that period.

All teams will adhere to an upgraded version of the governance provisions of the 1998 Concorde Agreement.

The following teams have been accepted for the 2010 FIA Formula One World Championship.

Team (Constructor)
Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro (Ferrari)
Vodafone McLaren Mercedes (McLaren Mercedes)
BMW Sauber F1 Team (BMW Sauber)
Renault F1 Team (Renault)
Panasonic Toyota Racing (Toyota)
Scuderia Toro Rosso (STR TBA)
Red Bull Racing (RBR TBA)
AT&T Williams (Williams Toyota)
Force India F1 Team (Force India Mercedes)
Brawn GP Formula One Team (Brawn TBA)
Campos Meta Team (Campos Cosworth)
Manor Grand Prix (Manor Cosworth)
Team US F1 (Team US F1 Cosworth)

In view of this new agreement and with the prospect of a stable future for Formula One, FIA President Max Mosley has confirmed his decision not to stand for re-election in October this year.

Vettel dominates and wins at Silverstone

Sebastian Vettel broke the monotony of Jensen Button winning everything by winning in a monotonous way at Silverstone. Vettel dominated the field in what is possibly the last F1 race at Silverstone.

Brawn still put together a good weekend with Barrichello finishing third, and Button sixth, but the results were a let down.  Button hoped to put an exclamation point on the first half of the season by winning in his homeland.

Lewis Hamilton’s disasterous season continued on Sunday with a 16th place finish in the McLaren after winning there in 2008.  It’s going to be a long summer for the champ.

Mark Webber had a fantastic weekend, and is poised to win a race sometime this season.  Webber had a shot at the pole, and finished second to give Red Bull a 1-2 finish.

The fact is that the entire weekend’s was overshadowed by the politics, and the looming split of the FOTA teams from F1.

Skysports:  Vettel end Button’s run

Vettel takes Silverstone F1 pole, Hamilton 19th

Sebastian Vettel took his second pole in a row at Silverstone today with a lap of 1:19.509.   Vettel beat out the Brawn of Rbens Barrichello by three tenths.  Red Bull is looking strong this weekend with Vettel on pole, and with Mark Webber qualifying third.

Mark Webber was pretty upset in post-race interviews.  He could have nipped Barrichello or even had a shot at the pole, but claimed that Kimi Raikkonen hampered his lap.   Webber said:

“I would have liked a slightly cleaner run on my last Q3 lap. Kimi was, uh, I don’t know, drinking some vodka or deaming or something.  I didn’t know what the hell he was doing, but he should have been on the right and he’s on the racing line and dreaming.  So that, uh, wrecked my lap.”

Ouch.  Webber’s not happy with the Fin.

But he’s over the moon compared to Lewis Hamilton who will start from the back row after qualifying 19th.   The world champ is fighting a bad car, and on the Speed TV broadcast this morning, he seemed to have written off the rest of the season.

The UK Telegraph has more on Vettel’s big day, and Hamilton’s woes.

STARTING GRID

Pos Driver
1 Sebastian Vettel
2 Rubens Barrichello
3 Mark Webber
4 Jarno Trulli
5 Kazuki Nakajima
6 Jenson Button
7 Nico Rosberg
8 Timo Glock
9 Kimi Raikkonen
10 Fernando Alonso
11 Felipe Massa
12 Robert Kubica
13 Heikki Kovalainen
14 Nelson A. Piquet
15 Nick Heidfeld
16 Giancarlo Fisichella
17 Sebastien Bourdais
18 Adrian Sutil
19 Lewis Hamilton
20 Sebastien Buemi

The empire strikes back - FIA to sue FOTA

You knew this was coming, but they sure wasted no time.  Max is threatening to sue now.

The Canadian Press reports:

“The FIA’s lawyers have now examined the FOTA threat to begin a breakaway series,” the organization said in a statement. “The actions of FOTA as a whole, and Ferrari in particular, amount to serious violations of law including willful interference with contractual relations, direct breaches of Ferrari’s legal obligations and a grave violation of competition law.

“The FIA will be issuing legal proceedings without delay.”

Canadian Press:  FIA plans legal action against FOTA

Imagine the tension in the paddock at Silverstone this weekend.

F1 in crisis - The eight elite teams of FOTA to form new series in 2010

Either hell just froze over, or the end is nigh.   The unfathomable, the unreal, the unbelievable, the insane, has happened.  Just as the open-wheel racing split of the 20th century has come and gone, the 21st century open-wheel split has begun.  Articles all over the web are rocking the autosports world with news that a Ferrari, McLaren, Renault, Toyota, BMW Sauber, Brawn GP, Red Bull Racing and Toro Rosso have all declined to enter the Formula 1 World Championship for 2010.

Today was the day of reckoning for Bernie and Max, and things certainly did not go their way.  The elite teams that really *are* Formula 1, announced that their team assocation will be forming a new series in 2010.

These eight teams make up the Formula One Teams’ Association (FOTA) which released a statement just hours ago that included:

“It has become clear, however, the teams cannot continue to compromise on the fundamental values of the sport and have declined to alter their original conditional entries to the 2010 world championship.

“These teams, therefore, have no alternative other than to commence the preparation for a new championship which reflects the values of its participants and partners.”

Sky News has more: F1 - Eight teams to form rival championship
BBC Sport has more of the FOTA statement:  Ft teams drop breakaway bombshell

Keith Collantine at the F1 Fanatic blog has his take on the situation. His headline: “F1 to split in two as FOTA teams announce their own championship”. I’m not exactly sure the headline really captures the devastation of today’s developments. This isn’t a “breaking in half”. This is *the* elite teams of F1 ripping away and leaving nothing but a few backmarker teams. One half is Mt. Everest, the other is mole hill.

Fan and media reaction is going to be interesting, to say the least.

D-Day gets pushed back to 6/19/09

D-Day has was supposed to have happened today in the world of F1, but seems to have been pushed back to June 19th.   So the drama continues as the world waits to find out who is going to be in F1 next season. Max and Co. said that McLaren, Sauber, Renault, Brawn, and Toyota have conditional entries, but Ferrari and Toro Rosso were quick to put the smack-down on Max and say that they have conditional entries as well.

These teams have demanded that the spending limits for the 2010 season be removed, and have placed entries based on that condition. Max has demanded that these conditions be removed by the 19th. 

Here we go again.

One interesting development after today’s FIA meetings was the announcement of three new provisional teams for 2010:

*Campos Grand Prix
*Manor Grand Prix
*Team US F1

Reuters India has a snapshot of each of the new teams.

REUTERS: Formula One’s new teams for 2010

Button puts Brawn on Monaco pole

If the off-season is known as “silly season”, this year’s regular season of F1 racing might be, to steal a line from Matchbox 20, a “Mad Season”.  The little team that could, Brawn, has put their car on pole for the 2009 Grand Prix of Monaco.   Jenson Button has really figured out how to get the most out of the Brawn package, and has won four pole positions in six races.

Kimi Räikkönen will try to use his KERS advantage to overtake Button from the second position on Sunday. Räikkönen’s qualifying result was a huge improvement over the first four races of the season where his best starting position was seventh, and he qualified an abysmal 16th in Spain two weeks ago.

Lewis Hamilton crashed. The champ was expected to take his newly tricked our McLaren to the front, but took it into a tire barrier instead in Q1. He’ll start 16th.

The UK Times has more on Button’s big day.

STARTING GRID

Pos 	Driver 		 	Team
1	Jenson Button 		Brawn-Mercedes
2	Kimi Raikkonen 		Ferrari
3	Rubens Barrichello 	Brawn-Mercedes
4	Sebastian Vettel 	Red Bull-Renault
5	Felipe Massa 		Ferrari
6	Nico Rosberg 		Williams-Toyota
7	Heikki Kovalainen 	McLaren-Mercedes
8	Mark Webber 		Red Bull-Renault
9	Fernando Alonso 	Renault
10	Kazuki Nakajima 	Williams-Toyota
11	Sebastien Buemi 	Toro Rosso-Ferrari
12	Nelson A. Piquet 	Renault
13	Giancarlo Fisichella 	Force India-Mercedes
14	Sebastien Bourdais 	Toro Rosso-Ferrari
15	Adrian Sutil 		Force India-Mercedes
16	Lewis Hamilton 		McLaren-Mercedes
17	Nick Heidfeld 		BMW Sauber
18	Robert Kubica 		BMW Sauber
19	Jarno Trulli 		Toyota
20	Timo Glock 		Toyota

McLaren At WMSC Hearing: “Off With Their Heads!”

As the oft quoted Madame Dufarge would have said, it’s time to separate McLaren’s head from its body. The World Motor Sport Council will deliberate the validity of McLaren’s Liargate charges and issue their punishment tomorrow. Read more

BrawnGP, Button, Win In Bahrain.

Jenson Button drove a measured, mistake free race to claim BrawnGP’s third victory out of four races this year. The Red Bull car of Sebastian Vettel came home second and the disappointing Toyota of Jarno Trulli claimed third. Read more

Jarno Trulli on Bahrain Pole

Toyota release:

Panasonic Toyota Racing is celebrating its best ever qualifying performance after Jarno Trulli and Timo Glock locked out the front row for tomorrow’s Bahrain Grand Prix. On a blisteringly hot and sunny day at the Bahrain International Circuit, air temperatures ranged from 35-38C while the track was 47-51C. Timo had set the fastest time during the morning practice session but he also suffered an electronics glitch. This afternoon he and Jarno did their first runs in Q1 on the medium compound tyre before switching to the super soft for the rest of the afternoon. They both sailed into Q3 and put together great laps. Jarno took pole with Timo alongside him on P2. Toyota will now look to make the most of this perfect start to the weekend in tomorrow’s race.

Read more