Can I race it?...

Why 2012 is already a more important year than 2011

The 2011 motorsport calendar is already a waste of time. There's not a lot really going to happen, and we may as well skip straight on to 2012.

Okay, I'm probably overdoing it a bit, but with so many 'transition years' for championships planned in 2011 in terms of technical regulations and competition, everything to really look forward to starts in 2012.

First, Formula One has delivered what apparently was the greatest championship in years (funnily enough, I preferred 2009, with the established order very much ruffled up) - there's not a lot happening. The F-Duct gets swapped back for KERS, we get a new aerodynamic system to grumble over in terms of the deliberately moving wings (as opposed to the already moving front wings Ferrari and Red Bull Racing are believed to have had earlier in the year)...and that's pretty much it.

In Indycar, the championship potters on to its sixth straight year of running as a spec series with Dallara chassis and Honda engines, with no one able to beat the dominant pairing of Chip Ganassi Racing and Penske Racing. That's unlikely to see much change in 2011, especially with the closest squad, Andretti Autosport, losing their most capable driver Tony Kanaan in sponsorship wrangles.

In DTM, the series will enter its third year with the development of the car frozen, with the Audi A4 DTM (R14) car again battling against Mercedes-Benz C-Klasse DTM machines whilst we wait for new regulations in 2012 and for BMW to join the fray.

In WTCC, we're currently set for an even thinner year than 2010, with BMW pulling its works team and only Volvo committing as a new manufacturer with just a single car evaluation entry. Unfortunately the Volvo car doesn't have a prayer against the third year Chevrolet Cruze LT and its new 1.6 litre turbo engine.

For 2012, all three of the above will get fixed (in theory).

Indycar will see a new chassis, albeit still a Dallara, but with teams able to change their own aerodynamic packages, with Chevrolet and Lotus already indicating they'll do just that (that's Lotus as in the car company, not the Mike Gascoyne/Tony Fernandes Formula 1 team).

Indycar will also have a battle of engine manufacturers for the first time since 2005, with Chevrolet coming in to take on Honda with engines developed by Ilmor (who built the Mercedes-Benz engine back in the CART days).

This will certainly change things as Penske have signed on with the Chevrolet engine from year one, so their performance will most likely dip if Chevrolet don't get the engine perfect straight-away (which is fairly likely). No matter what happens, it'll be interesting to see, and who follows suit in developing their own aero and running the Chevy.

In 2012, the DTM also has new technical regulations, with a lower cost car for Audi and Mercedes, and the third of the premium three German brands, BMW, joining in as well after leaving the WTCC and Formula 1 in recent years.

The WTCC has its new engine coming in for 2011, but its all the new manufacturers in 2012 that the series is waiting for in order to put on a show. Championship promoter Marcello Lotti has made a lot of noise of interested parties, but none have made any formal commitment as yet.

The BTCC will probably start to see more new cars built in 2012 as well, as teams will start to switch from the S2000 cars to get ready for the 'all NGTC' regulations to be in force in 2013. At present, most of the teams will just run the new engine specification in 2011 to get things started, and to be able to benefit from the drop in cost of the S2000 engine.

So, 2012 is going to be a fascinating year for international motorsport, in particular Indycar, which is looking good to make a full recovery from a painful decade of open wheel racing in the US. 2011 is just an in-between year for many, where we keep guessing and asking about 2012!

The disqualification of BMW from Japan

The outcome of the 2010 World Touring Car Championship was controversially decided in the courts and not on the track for the first time in the championship’s six year history. 

A quick reminder, Yvan Muller had picked up his second WTCC title one week before the final round in Macau, on account of his only rival, BMW's Andy Priaulx, losing his second place result in race one at the penultimate round at Okayama, Japan and the additional points Chevrolet picked up after his team-mates disqualification as well.

The issue surrounded BMW's switch to a six-speed sequential gearbox, which at the time looked like a sly move from the Belgian based RBM team, taking advantage of a loophole created by the WTCC created when managing the allocation of penalty ballast across the various models and ages of car throughout the 2010 season.

In the FIA S2000 technical regulations, BMW are welcome to run a six-speed sequential gearbox as their competitors do, but would have to take an additional penalty of an increase of 30 kilograms to the cars base weight before performance ballasts are applied. Because of this, BMW have never entered a six-speed sequential car in the World Touring Car Championship, save for the modified car previously raced by Alex Zanardi. This was part of an equalisation measure taking into account Zanardi's disability, with the Italian racing with prosthetic legs as a result of his disastrous crash at Lausitz in the Champcar World Series back in 2001.

Chevrolet Motorsport Manager Eric Néve was quick to state Chevrolet's intention to appeal at Japan. On the first day of the weekend, BMW went on to secure a 1-2 in qualifying, taking their first 1-2 of the season, and Priaulx's first pole since 2006 - showing the car had definitely gained performance, through a combination of either the gearbox or the fact that car was now running 30kg lighter than in previous rounds.

Contrastingly, the races didn't go well for BMW. In the wet, the rear-wheel drive BMWs struggled in comparison with their front-wheel drive counterparts, and Chevrolet's Rob Huff took a comfortable win in the tricky conditions in the first race, with Priaulx falling to second place. In race two, Priaulx lost control of his 320si and ended up in the gravel trap, retiring from the race, and just claiming 18 points from the whole weekend.

At the FIA International Court of Appeal (ICA) on November 12th, representatives from Chevrolet Europe, SEAT Customer Technologies, Bamboo Engineering & BMW Team RBM attended, along with the National Sporting Authority (ASN's) of the RACB (Belgium) representing RBM, and the MSA (UK) representing Chevrolet & Bamboo, with SEAT not formally represented by an ASN.

The main question was one of documentation, and the eligibility of the sequential gearbox in the BMW 320si.

The principal argument by Chevrolet was that the 'BMW 320si GBS' was not a recognised homologation for BMW to use for anyone else other than Zanardi. RBM argued that it was, and that the list of homologated vehicles does not specifically state that the sequential gearbox car was for just for Zanardi. This was the central issue of the appeal, over-riding all others.

The only homologation that existed within the WTCC for a six-speed BMW was for the car run by Alex Zanardi by ROAL Motorsport up until the end of 2009. Although sequential gearboxes are run in BMW 320sis in other touring car series running to S2000 regulations, they've never been approved by the WTCC.

Homologation of a race car is one of the most important principles of the WTCC. The FIA Touring Car Committee exists to preside over homologation and related technical decisions, with the granting of various waivers and dispensations to ensure equality, fairness as well as to create a competitive series.

Although cars which have not been homologated by the WTCC have competed on occasion, such as the Volvo C30 of Polestar racing, these allowances always come with decisions to ensure fairness to the competitors which do run to the WTCC rules. The Volvo for example has been invisible to the points placings and not factored in the Q2 and top ten grid reversal (Though this will change next year when nationally homologated cars do become eligible).

Chevrolet's argument, supported by SEAT & Bamboo, was that the waiver was specifically for Zanardi, referencing a recent e-mail from the Touring Car Committee which described it exactly as such. Chevrolet also made reference to West Surrey Racing's (WSR) failed attempt to run with a sequential gearbox earlier in the season, with the Touring Car Committee ruling that the sequential gearbox homologation solely applies to Alex Zanardi in their response and denial of WSR's request.

BMW Team RBM's counters to Chevrolet's claims, were that the e-mail in question was not a decision by the Touring Car Committee, and was in effect just inaccurate correspondence, and that West Surrey Racing were planning to run an entirely different set of gear and final drive ratios and so this point was not relevant.

In the end, neither of these points had a significant effect on the final decision of the ICA.

One of the main criticisms of this ordeal has been the fact that the stewards had allowed BMW Team RBM to run with the sequential box in the first instance, and that the subsequent ruling unfairly punishes the team for what in essence is an error by the WTCC stewards.

The ICA decision identifies that an e-mail was sent by the Chairman of the Stewards, Yves Bacquelaine, to BMW Team RBM in response to a query from the team, appearing to confirm the right for RBM to use the sequential gearbox prior to the meeting in Okayama.

The RACB and RBM argued that the stewards have the supreme authority in enforcing the regulations of the WTCC, and have the right to overturn the technical delegate's report as well as the Touring Car Committee - and so this e-mail and the subsequent decisions published in Japan allowing the team to run the sequential gearbox were valid authorisations for them to race with the gearbox.

Chevrolet argued that this communication between Yves Bacquelaine and RBM was not an official part of the process. Bamboo also expressed concern for the lack of use of proper channels, with just an informal communication between the stewards and RBM effectively making critical technical decisions with no publication effectively subverting the opportunity for the other teams to protest or appeal them.

SEAT also backed up Chevrolet, supporting the belief that the WTCC stewards do not have the right to authorise non-homologated parts.
RBM's counter-argument was that it's entirely valid for a competitor to ask clarification from the stewards.

The ICA ruled that the correspondence between Yves Bacquelaine and RBM was not to be regarded as official, and would not be accepted as a legally recognised communiqué.
The decision of the ICA also recognised that the powers of the stewards also do not extend to being able to over-ride the decisions of the Touring Car Committee in regards to homologation, as that is the express domain of the committee and solely within their jurisdiction.

In regards to the argument surrounding whether the BMW 320si GBS (sequential) was a recognised general homologation, or whether it was implicitly for Zanardi only, the ICA confirmed that RBM's interpretation of the homologation listing was not correct, and that the homologation document needs to be considered directly. The renewal of the homologation docuementation of the BMW 320si GBS for the 2010 season (although not used) expressly refers to the 'Zanardi car waiver', and considered that the intention of the homologation of a six-speed sequential gearbox within the WTCC has only always been specifically for Zanardi.

The ruling of the FIA ICA was to annul the decisions made by the stewards and as a result excluded RBM drivers Augusto Farfus and Andy Priaulx from Japan, which handed the driver’s championship to Chevrolet.

In the end, the decision made little difference to the outcome of the championship winner. Although BMW had to return to a five-speed manual for Okayama, and had to pile the weight back on, a crash in race one for Priaulx and Yvan Muller's third place would still have secured the Frenchman the title, as Priaulx would have needed two substantial results at Macau to challenge for his fourth WTCC title.

As a result of this whole affair, RBM appear to have suffered through a failure of due process. It's fairly clear that RBM made the switch to the sequential gearbox to try and take advantage of what was an error in the regulations in regards to the allocation of weight penalties, as well as taking advantage of the waiver which was always intended for Alex Zanardi only.

The weight penalties were a secondary factor however, as the ruling around the illegality of the BMW 320si with a six-speed gearbox superceded any decision around the separate weight ballasts. Although RBM did what it believed they needed to by checking with the stewards prior to running the new gearbox at Japan, the ICA decision demonstrated that the stewards over stepped their authority, but unfortunately the punishment could only fall on RBM, which may have cost them places in the final drivers standings.

How the situation will affect BMW’s plans for 2011, with a question mark still sitting over their entry into next season remains to be seen.

 

If Turkington was still an independent

A quick re-cap, as it was so long ago.

2009 champion Colin Turkington turned up with Dick Bennetts' highly proficient West Surrey Racing squad for three rounds of the WTCC earlier this year.

Colin hadn't raced since the finale at Brands Hatch in October 2009, where he'd clinched his first overall title in the British Touring Car Championship, as well the independents' championship for the third consecutive year. He turned up in Portimao, learned the circuit quickly and impressed on his debut, almost taking a win in the independents' class before a little bit of touring car action knocked him down to fourth (in class).

At Brands Hatch, Colin moved from impressive to astonishing, and was almost the most dominant BMW throughout the weekend, taking the highest score in the WTCC independents' class in its six year history (56 points).

BMW Motorsport enjoyed his performance so much, their press releases started including him alongside Andy Priaulx and Augusto Farfus, almost as if he'd suddenly become the third works BMW driver.

The WTCC decided to fix the flaw in the independents' points system for Brno, removing the bonus points for independent drivers who finish in the overall classification.

After Turkington qualified third overall however, the WTCC decided that was enough. Despite West Surrey Racing not receiving a penny from BMW, they were too good in the WTCC's eyes to be counted as an independent, and the point for pole position at Brno was the last Turkington would get in the independents' category.

There was a similar precedent set for removing over qualified independent drivers before. Roberto Colciago, Duncan Huisman and Tom Coronel were excluded from the independents' class in previous years. There's a big difference between these drivers and Turkington however - all three of these drivers are veterans in the World Touring Car  (and European Touring Car) Championship, all highly familiar with the circuits and the ways of the championship, unlike Turkington.

The teams themselves were also very experienced. Coronel was with GR Asia, who had been in the championship since its ETCC days. It's also notable that Coronel was later was allowed back into the independents' championship in 2009 because, ultimately, he was an independent. When Colciago competed in 2005, he was racing with JAS Motorsport, an ex-manufacturer squad - and Colciago himself was an ex-factory Alfa Romeo driver, so these exceptions at least made sense.

West Surrey Racing, prior to 2010 have only competed in the WTCC twice; at Macau and Brands Hatch back in 2007.

Why Turkington and WSR were removed from the independents' category from Brno onwards isn't because the team or driver has been judged as not being a true independent. The reasoning was actually absent from the WTCC's announcement. In print it actually excludes the particular car Turkington is racing, as opposed to the team or driver, but the real reason is almost certainly is made up of two things:

1. The WTCC looking after its own. West Surrey Racing have no long term commitment to the WTCC at this point.  The team's first home is still the BTCC - whereas the teams which were threatened by WSR's performance, such as Scuderia Proteam, have been in the WTCC since the start. And don't forget, the independents' prize money is a very big incentive to the teams.

2. Stopping the independents' trophy from becoming a mockery of itself.

The main criticism is of the extra point for finishing in the overall classification. In 2010, this was made to match the new FIA points system (25, 18, 15, 12, 10, 8, 6, 4, 2, 1). Previously this has been triple points on the old system (e.g. a win for an independent would score 10 points x 3 = 30).

Very rarely do independents' finish particular high up in the top ten, though occassional good results have worked out well for Coronel & Hernández before.

WSR Team Manager Mike Ewan confessed to me this part of the points system was probably a little silly - and they were happy to continue with the bonus points taken away, as was the decision made by the WTCC just prior to Brno. With WSR right on the pace with the front runners, they were of course on target for a lot of points with this points system.

The independents' trophy has always been made up of the teams who flounder around behind the manufacturer runners. TV time is highly limited for these guys. Rarely has the camera picked them up behind the five works BMWs, five works SEATs, three Chevrolets and assorted Ladas, Alfas & Hondas that we've had in the championship in years gone by.

Now here, in this reduced 2010 grid, we had an independent BMW running almost as strongly  as the works RBM team, making the other independents look foolish.

And why shouldn't they be up there? WSR had taken on the might of RML in the BTCC in 2009, and manufacturer backed teams such as SEAT & Vauxhall and often won over the past few years. They're a top level team, but ultimately they are just a 'national series' champion...it's a worrying precedent to say that the national champion of a touring car series isn't allowed to move up to the WTCC unless he's not going to be classed as an independent?

At the present moment in time, that restricts the available manufacturer drives next year to...well, three - and they're all taken.

So, on to the 2010 WTCC Independents' standings IF Colin Turkington was still classed as an independent, and the original points system was still in place. Not forgetting the next round is Macau, where there would be double points - if Turkington could walk away with the independents' trophy after just competing in five of eleven rounds, you can see really why the WTCC felt the need to alter the system. 

That I won't argue with - it was there to incentivise an independent to get up the front, but what was the point - they were already trying their best? It's not as though the £250,000 bonus for winning an overall race in the BTCC is still there - once independent drivers like Matt Neal can get up there regularly, those prizes are quickly taken away, but it still doesn't make sense why Turkington isn't allowed to compete in the category with a corrected points system.

2010 WTCC Yokohama Independent Trophy Standings w/Colin Turkington & Original Points System

1. Colin Turkington - 150 pts
2. Sergio Hernández - 122 pts
3. Kristian Poulsen - 106 pts
4. Darryl O'Young - 102 pts
5. Franz Engstler - 89 pts
6. Stefano D'Aste - 86 pts
7. Mehdi Bennani - 64 pts
8. Harry Vaulkhard - 59 pts
9. Andrei Romanov - 28 pts
10. Yukinori Taniguchi - 23 pts
11. Marc Carol - 16 pts
12. Pierre-Yves Corthals - 13 pts
13. Tom Boardman - 8 pts
14. Fabio Fabiani - 6 pts
15. Tim Coronel - 4 pts
16. Nobuteru Taniguchi - 4 pts
17. Masataka Yanagida - 4 pts

BMW to the DTM. BMW from the WTCC?

BMW Motorsport have today confirmed that they will enter the DTM in 2012, after previously agreeing to enter the championship alongside Mercedes-Benz and Audi in principle earlier this year.

via www.touringcartimes.com

Well, a new manufacturer entering a championship is usually never bad news.

But now we begin the long wait to see what lasting effect this will have on BMW's commitment to the World Touring Car Championship.

Those in the know can't believe that BMW will leave a market they seem to have a massive influence over. If you look around all major touring car programmes across the world (Europe and Asia mainly) that have followed the WTCC's Super 2000 format implemented in 2002, BMW 320sis are everywhere!

They have a massive market in supply of chassis, parts and engines across the tin-top motorsport market, and though DTM will allow them to beat their arch rivals at home in the DTM, we're not going to see those cars racing too much further afield with costs near half a million Euro's per car.

The question really is what will BMW do with the WTCC. One important factor is that some of BMW's supply markets are about to die out pretty quickly. There's only two years of life left for the S2000 BMW in the BTCC, before it's relegated to a backmarker car; the Danish Touring Car series has now closed/merged with the Swedish championship - and they're edging ever closer to a format like the Belgian or British regulations and away from S2000.

Where one door closes, another opens of course, and we're yet to see what may happen with the proposed Japanese Touring Car Championship, which will certainly be a market BMW would like to be involved in.

So will Bart Mampaey's team be left to start funding their own WTCC operation almost like an independent, but with BMW supplied parts? - has West Surrey Racing's frankly startling performance at Porto, Brands and Brno told the Munich bunch that independents can do as well at a fraction of the investment cost?

Time will tell. They've already confirmed that independents can run their new 1.6 turbo engines next year. Armed with the same machinery, if the likes of Proteam Motorsport and West Surrey Racing (if they do WTCC) can get close to RBM, we'll probably see a 'BMW Customers Technology' programme soon enough for 2012 as they go all out to make sure they take on Mercedes-Benz & Audi at their best.

It's all change for European Touring Car racing, 2011's going to be an interesting season indeed before everything changes in 2012.

Penalty for a self-inflicted penalty?

The FIA World Touring Car Championship has set a very curious precedent in punishing Chevrolet driver Alain Menu twice this season for dropping back to eighth place, first at Brands Hatch in July, and now this last weekend at Valencia.

The World Touring Car Championship, and European championship before it, has had a common place reverse grid feature in place to help shuffle up the racing.

In 2002, the top six were reversed, and from 2003 onwards the top eight – this was in line with the points paying positions in the championship, with the exception of this year, where points now like Formula 1 go down to tenth, but still only the top eight get swapped around.

It’s used in GP2 as well, and works quite well. It was also adopted by the British Touring Car Championship in 2004 as the new ‘jumble factor’ to replace pit-stops when the championship allowed S2000 cars in. As S2000 cars don’t have a single wheelnut like the then championship specification BTC cars did, it wouldn’t really have been that fair otherwise.

It’s fairly rare for a driver in the WTCC to deliberately drop back to eighth place.

Generally the battle is for the driver to move up from ninth to eighth, it brings in this interesting scenario in race one where effectively you’re watching both a race and a qualifying session at the same time. Some drivers are out front trying to win the race, whilst others are battling for eighth – or more precisely pole position for race two. Whoever’s fourth, fifth and sixth barely matter.

Chevrolet and/or Alain Menu certainly worked out something at Brands Hatch. He’s not going to win many races running up with Robert Huff and Yvan Muller when his title chances were pretty much done for after a rough start to the season, and he had to start conceding positions to his teammates (in the WTCC, this is allowed it seems). So he worked his way down to pole position…I mean eighth place in the first race. He knew it was a bit cheeky, hence he implied it was a mechanical issue afterwards, but turns out that must be a lie, because in the evening the stewards whopped him with a 30 second penalty, taking away his one point of the day.

That was too late to stop him from starting from pole position of course, so effectively it turns out that unlike some championships that give you a point for getting pole for race one, the WTCC decided to take one off you if you earned it by going backwards to get it and throwing away 14 points (difference between third and eighth) in order to get it.

It’s a pretty strange scenario, punishing the driver for striving for pole position, taking advantage of the race format and the regulations that are in place, whilst the driver had already decided on taking a penalty himself by dropping the positions – because even then, it’s a gamble. These 14 points don’t automatically earn him 25 points in the next race – nothing was going to stop Menu from finishing third whilst cruising to the end of the race at Brands Hatch. Okay, he’s now starting race two from pole…yes, it gives him a better chance of a win than most, but in race two with the standing start format, he’s more than likely to be pushed or passed by a BMW, or out-accelerated by the turbo diesel SEAT anyway – he bet his £14 on a 6/4 chance of a better return in race two…and indeed, both BMWs got ahead of him, and then he was caught up in an accident with Farfus and lost his stake.

At Valencia, with teammates Rob Huff and Yvan Muller second and third, Chevrolet and Menu rolled the same dice – and he dropped back to eighth. An even better show followed this time, as Ben Constanduros gave him the light version of the stewards interrogation between races – you got told off for this before, why’ve you done it again? (more or less) – and Menu puts on his best Domenicali inspired performance to explain that no, it really was a problem – but it’s all better now.

It was another bad gamble, don’t take tips from Alain - he lost out again, and was taken off the track and ended up 11^th and out of the points.

Then came the stewards investigation. Again, clearly he wasn’t believed, and so he was punished again. Another 30 second penalty taking away his only point of the weekend? No, this time the penalty is different, this time pole position for race two costs money, 5,000 EUR to be precise.

What are the teams to learn from this? Don’t drop places or we’ll spin the wheel and see what we’ll hit you with? prizes range from 30 second time penalties, 10 place grid drops, unlimited fines or a whipping. It’s particularly strange as he’d already gained nothing from his gamble anyway, one wonders what would have happened if he’d won from pole position? I’d personally bet that 30 second penalty would magically move from the race one result to the race two result.

Anyway, Alain’s clearly been bad, it clearly states in the rules that you can’t drop positions.

Oh wait, no it doesn’t. What it does say in the FIA International Sporting Code, and what he’s been found guilty of twice now is this:

Article 151. Any of the following offences in addition to any offences specifically referred to previously, shall be deemed to be a breach of these rules :

c.) Any fraudulent conduct or any act prejudicial to the interests of any competition or to the interests of motorsport generally.

The ISC also lists the penalties in order of increasing severity. A reprimand is first, next up is a fine, and a time penalty is third – so, to repeat the offence means it’s less serious?

The problem extends beyond the lack of consistency in the penalty to other things.

Firstly, proof. Unless Alain broke down and admitted it in the stewards meeting, who’s to say he didn’t have a problem? The FIA do have access to a great deal of data, but I don’t fancy they’ll be wanting to plough through all of it checking to see if that accidental slide in race one that drops A N Other driver conveniently down to eighth was deliberate or not.

The second is was there actually a crime? Is it really unsporting to want pole position for race two? Does that mean it’s unsporting when Gabriele Tarquini went out there and set the fastest lap in qualifying?

The rules say whoever’s eighth gets pole position.

The rules say prize money is awarded in championship order, and points are given out in a certain order, from first backwards.

The rules do not state it’s everyones obligation to try and move forward or stay in position, but not to fall backwards unless it’s not deliberate, it’s just a general expectation as you want to get more points…but if you’ve got a better chance of getting more points by falling back, where is the actual harm?

If the WTCC doesn’t want drivers to do it, then they need to look at the rules first and not punish the drivers for playing the system they created.

For examples of fixes of course, you don’t have to look too far.

The BTCC made a mistake when they implemented reverse grids in 2004. Their three race format had the reverse grid (then top ten) in the second race, which gave Jason Plato his strategy for the season, in the SEAT Toledo which could not compete on pace with the dominant Vauxhall Astra Coupe – which he himself had won the championship with three years earlier - to score strongly all year by aiming for tenth place in race one, and reaping the spoils in races two and three. What team was Plato driving for back then of course? The answer is RML, the team that run Chevrolet in the WTCC and BTCC now.

The BTCC fixed this error in 2005, moving the reverse grid to the third race, but didn’t wipe it out completely with drivers till trying to finish tenth quite often, so from 2006 they added a random element – the draw, where anything from the top six to ten get reversed. Drivers don’t fall back now, as you never know where you’re going to end up – sixth place is pretty safe as at least you’re guaranteed to be in the top five for the last race, whilst any further back is increasingly more of a gamble.

The penalty is a worrying example of a lack of consistency and just cause for punishment seen in the WTCC this year – and we can just be thankful that this hasn’t really changed anything, yet. 

Team Orders in F1 - Be gone!

I think it’s evident from the ruling that the FIA is actually starting to recognise its position on team orders is simple untenable.

When you build up a championship where the grand prize, or grand prix if you prefer, is the drivers’ world championship, you can’t expect teams not to start looking at ways to ensure that they achieve that all important goal.

Okay, there’s a constructors championship, but primarily people remember the drivers’ champions and the cars that they were driving at the time. Who really remembers that Ferrari were the 2008 constructors champions? No, it was Lewis Hamilton in the McLaren that won in F1 in almost everyone's memory except the most devoted statistics lovers.

Teams are of course going to start manipulating the results as early as they can to ensure one of their drivers wins that title, and as soon as a team thinks that letting one score over the other is a threat to that all important championship, or in the case of a single race, that their two drivers actually competing for position could cause trouble, they will in most cases intervene (we've seen what happens when they don't (insert point towards Red Bull Racing).

The problem is how do you actually rule what a team order is? There’s no part of article 39.1 that isn’t woefully subject to interpretation.

If the FIA wants to ban team orders, then they have to define what it is. The problem is, if they do define what it is, then teams will know exactly what is outside of the boundary and work outside of it.

Some might say providing better parts to one driver over the other is a team order.

Some might say ordering one of your drivers not to attempt to pass the other is a team order.

And those are the two examples from Ferrari’s chief rivals that we already know about. What are the ones we don't see? What about the teams that are too small for many to really care about whether they employ team orders?

The problem is, team orders aren’t really a bad thing, and the truth is the FIA doesn’t want to get rid of them.

What Red Bull did, the FIA don’t mind, what McLaren did, the FIA don’t mind. Quite evidently as a result of the World Motorsport Council's ruling in truth, what Ferrari did, the FIA don’t care about either…but when it comes to the average viewer, the general media, who wants to feel they’ve seen two drivers, even if they’re in their own team compete at the highest level, to a point where if they even take each other out, just like Red Bull did in Turkey, the viewer can see at least they tried to fight for it.

From any team's perspective, what happened in Turkey was ridiculous, and should never happen…but the teams must have some control to prevent their drivers from compromising the teams’ goal of winning the Formula 1 drivers championship.

The rule would be overlooked in scenarios where the rule just seemed to work against the sport as well, another reason why it’s so foolish.

For example, let’s say it’s the last race of the season; Sebastien Vettel has been ruled out of the championship, it’s now Mark Webber vs. Lewis Hamilton for the 2010 Formula 1 drivers championship – but wait, Webber’s in second place behind Vettel, and Hamilton is in third…the way the points stand in this hypothetical scenario means if the result stays like it is, Hamilton will win the championship by two points. If Vettel pulls over and lets Webber through, problem sorted, Red Bull are Formula 1 champions – but oh no, there’s Article 39.1.

So if Vettel pulls into the pits unnecessarily to get out of the way, is that a team order? Does it have to be said on the radio? Does it have to be agreed beforehand in some way to qualify?

Todt didn’t get involved, because the obvious declaration of bias would be thrown around if he did…even more than it is now than if he wasn’t. Of course it’s unavoidable: the former team manager of Ferrari is now in charge of the FIA!

The most important action to come out of the WMSC hearing is their review of 39.1. That says, they recognise something is wrong about it. The fact Ferrari were forced into a position where they blatantly had to lie about a very obvious implementation of a team order is the issue.

If they’d ‘dropped’ a wheel nut in the pitstop, would that have been fine? If after the pit board was put out with P3 shown as P03, and then Massa ‘accidentally’ skidded at the next corner and let Alonso through, that would have been fine? So as long as joe public were deceived properly, that’s okay, and that’s where 39.1 becomes a joke - it's not a sporting regulation, it's an entertainment regulation. Personally, I don’t want to have to think Massa was an idiot, I like to know when a driver is doing the right thing for the team.

The rule came in because Ferrari were fiddling results in a championship where there was no real threat to their No.1 driver from winning the championship, and Ferrari took away a victory from Rubens that would actually have been more popular than just another ordinary runaway Schumacher victory, in a season that transpired to be one of the most dire Formula 1 seasons on record.

Down with Article 39.1, and let’s get back to sanity again.