Luca di Montezemolo skeptical about budget caps in F1
Luca di Montezemolo believes that cost reduction is the number one priority in Formula 1 and that something must be done as soon as possible, but not necessarily in the way things have been initiated so far. He wants a strong impact from the FIA to improve the economic situation of most teams.
During the announcement of the changes made to the various regulations of the Formula 1 World Championship for 2014, the International Automobile Federation also approved the creation of a working group to limit the budgets of F1 teams starting from 2015. The working group created by the FIA will be composed of team representatives, the FIA, and the FOM, which holds the commercial rights to F1. This decision follows discussions among teams who are convinced that the future of F1 must involve cost reduction.
But Luca di Montezemolo, the head of Ferrari, expressed – quoted by *Autosport* – his skepticism about how to decide and implement this cost cap, particularly through a limited budget: « For the first time, it was said that we had to define a [cost] limit. You know why I have doubts about the cap – because it’s very easy to cheat – especially for [manufacturer] teams. And Ferrari could be one of them. I could go to Chrysler in Detroit to ask them to do something for us. Mercedes could ask their parent company. We need to find something credible but cost is the number one issue. »
The Italian also believes that the predominance of pay drivers is an indicator of F1’s poor health and only confirms that change is necessary: « If you look at the teams today, in my entire F1 career, I have never seen teams survive on drivers’ money. This year all driver movements have been – except for Räikkönen to Ferrari – based on the money drivers can bring to the teams. This is the case for Force India, Sauber, Lotus, and Williams. It’s not healthy… »
Di Montezemolo finally believes it is up to the FIA to decide on the limits to be set in terms of costs because, for him, the involvement of engineers is not a good thing: « The cost cannot be decided by technicians – because if that is the case, we will never get there. The only way to approach this is to tell the FIA that all teams are unanimous on the agreement to reduce costs. Do what you want – come back to us with a proposal that can clearly reduce costs in a really, very, very significant way. Then we will have to adapt. We must achieve this objective of drastically lowering costs. »
