Jun 15, 2009

Mosley's in Hot Water Again

By JR Nerad

The wonderful thing about Formula One is that the in-fighting and intrigue that goes on in the background is usually more interesting than the racing. And so it is again this week when International Automobile Federation (FIA) President Max Mosley finds himself in yet more hot water. Mosley is perhaps best-known for a sexual peccadillo that became public last year, but this time the hot water has nothing to do with sex. It has to do with the fact that he has backed himself into a corner with the powerful teams that make up Formula One. 

Earlier this year, Mosley proposed and instituted a spending limit on Formula One teams participating in the series in 2010. The $64.2 million-per-team spending cap was designed to make the sport more accessible to more teams and the racing more competitive. But eight of the current 10 teams -- all members of the upstart Formula One Teams Association (FOTA) -- have basically told Mosley his spending cap is a nonstarter. Led by Ferrari, which is adamantly against the spending cap, the teams have said they want a rewrite of the Concorde Agreement before they commit to the series for 2010.

Now Mosley has told them: Commit to the series and the new rules now so you can have a chance to change them. Otherwise…well, otherwise we might just go on without you. The F1 honcho claims it’s too late to change the rules prior to the teams signing on for 2010, but he has broadly hinted that if the FOTA teams sign on, then negotiations on the 2010 rules can begin all over again. 

In the meantime, only Williams and Force India have signed unconditional entries for the 2010 season. In an interesting sidebar, FIA claims that Ferrari is committed to participate in the 2010 season due to a sub-rosa contract the two organizations signed earlier, but Ferrari disputes that it is contractually obligated to participate next year. Frankly, we’d like to see the court case on that one should F1 try to enforce its agreement while Ferrari continues to say no.

All this wrangling brings up the renewed possibility of a break-away series to be contested by former Formula One teams, but of course, we have seen this possibility surface countless times before, never to be realized. So perhaps Max can drag himself out of the soup one more time.

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