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Ruslan

Under New Management

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Ferrari has been on front end of the grid for very long time. To say that means nothing involves strong personal bias, and there is no point to discuss it any further. These are personal values, hard to rationalize.They are a one of top - iconic - teams to me who are actually The Mr. F1, ahead of McLaren or Mercedes, or any other British teams, and definitely ahead of RBR as far as their statue is concerned. 

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13 hours ago, Sakae said:

Last time I've checked, we live in capitalism (as opposed to communism). It is a system, in which people negotiate and manage their income to the best they can...

I agree, not just on this issue of freedom in contract negotiations but all the way down to salaries and budgets.

Another matter is the idea that F1 has to be a billion-dollar business or nothing at all.

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5 hours ago, Sakae said:

Ferrari has been on front end of the grid for very long time. To say that means nothing involves strong personal bias, and there is no point to discuss it any further. These are personal values, hard to rationalize.They are a one of top - iconic - teams to me who are actually The Mr. F1, ahead of McLaren or Mercedes, or any other British teams, and definitely ahead of RBR as far as their statue is concerned. 

Yeah but they manipulate the sport to suit them or they threaten to leave like they did in the late 80s

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7 hours ago, maure said:

I agree, not just on this issue of freedom in contract negotiations but all the way down to salaries and budgets.

Another matter is the idea that F1 has to be a billion-dollar business or nothing at all.

Are you surprised about production cost to field a top level racing car? I don't think anyone said - we need to spend x-amount of money just "because we can", however once they found out they do need 1300 employees just to stay at the top and support technologically complicated device, then one should not be overwhelmed by bottom line cost. Building a racing "space shuttle" alike car within limits of current restrictions, and fielding it every two weeks around the globe is not exactly a cost saving exercise. Simplify rules and specifications targets, and cost will follow on downwards slope as well. Check a front wing, which looks like something batman dreamt up. Do we need to have those? It's all too complicated, and thus expensive.

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5 hours ago, Emmcee said:

Yeah but they manipulate the sport to suit them or they threaten to leave like they did in the late 80s

They all do as it suits them, from Manor to RBR, Mercedes and McLaren, however picking up on one team seem a bad habit some people possess. 

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6 hours ago, Emmcee said:

Yeah but they manipulate the sport to suit them or they threaten to leave like they did in the late 80s

threatening to leave the sport seems to be a safe way of getting legacy money in F1 because that is exactly what RBR did, and they did it again when they didn't win and as a result were allowed to bend the rules.

In the end it seems to me that in F1 everyone is weighted by their relative importance for the F1 business: you bring many spectators? here's $100m! You have 2 teams and can blackmail the organisers? here's a few tens of millions to keep you happy! and so on. Only the ones who don't have much barganing power get little.

I personally believe that if F1 handed out prize money only it would be better (and anyone should be allowed to enter, if you and I build a car in my garage and it's in compliance with the FIA rules and the kid next door has a superlicence we should be allowed to race), but if you want to lock in teams for years you have to give them something, that IMHO is the main problem. In the good old days they didn't have legacy money because they didn't have to tie teams into the sport for many years at a time and everyone could turn up and try to qualify, even good old Andrea Mode :scarf:

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Series uniqueness and aura is part of secret distinguishing this one from other series. Like some private golf courses with gates open to a few, in F1 Mercedes wants to be compared to Audi, BMW, and alike. PR talk such as we need Manor literally puts me off for phony undertones, because no one yet has explained to me what exactly Manor brought to the table other then bad headlines in media, begging for money snd running from one bankruptcy court to another, insisting on playing a game which they cannot afford. Front line top technologies on steep development curve is expensive, which very few can afford. Once you get 40 cars on the track and see 30 overtakes for a lead within one race, the game is over with big yawn. Having said that, neither oversimplification or overcomplicating it is correct. Ross, based on all interviews so far, is well aware of danger he is facing, but I like what I am hearing. We need to give him chance resolving good part of 20% most serious problems. I wonder if Strategy Group will survive. He said many years ago, it was an experiment which was supposed to be reviewed and perhaps scrapped if necessary. It did not happened, but we see what will happen now.

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3 hours ago, Sakae said:

Are you surprised about production cost to field a top level racing car? I don't think anyone said - we need to spend x-amount of money just "because we can", however once they found out they do need 1300 employees just to stay at the top and support technologically complicated device, then one should not be overwhelmed by bottom line cost. Building a racing "space shuttle" alike car within limits of current restrictions, and fielding it every two weeks around the globe is not exactly a cost saving exercise. Simplify rules and specifications targets, and cost will follow on downwards slope as well. Check a front wing, which looks like something batman dreamt up. Do we need to have those? It's all too complicated, and thus expensive.

Exactly.

Standing regulations are meant to force costs to remain at a specific level, namely, at the level of maximum exclusivity and yielding returns. F1 is a touring showcase for certain brands to market their wares. The competition is the pretense. F1 is not a sport but a business opportunity reserved for a very, very few selected companies.

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2 hours ago, maure said:

Exactly.

Standing regulations are meant to force costs to remain at a specific level, namely, at the level of maximum exclusivity and yielding returns. F1 is a touring showcase for certain brands to market their wares. The competition is the pretense. F1 is not a sport but a business opportunity reserved for a very, very few selected companies.

I have no specific evidence in support of my long standing suspicion, that results are occasionally nudged into "right" direction. Last year Mexico race was most prominent showcase of it in recent memory. So, to large extend I agree with you.

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8 hours ago, Sakae said:

They all do as it suits them, from Manor to RBR, Mercedes and McLaren, however picking up on one team seem a bad habit some people possess. 

Yeah your right, they all do it but I don't remember any other team that threatened to leave the sport unless they had it there way and even go as far as building an Indy car to proove to f1 that they weren't kidding. Unfortunately the car never saw a race as Ferrari all of sudden resolved there issue and  back in f1 like nothing ever happened. What happened to this Indy car you ask? Never saw a circuit again, could still be in one piece on display somewhere but iam not sure. Also sakae, making assumptions is a bad habit some have to don't you think sakae?

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I can help you with memories - Mercedes and RBR both did it just recently. Honda was implying they will leave, unless deployment of hybrids continue. RBR is one of the worst (most demanding), IMHO.

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A quote by Ecclestone

Quote

Anyone who doesn’t speak English isn’t worth speaking to

Good bye Mr. Ecclestone.

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11 hours ago, Sakae said:

I have no specific evidence in support of my long standing suspicion, that results are occasionally nudged into "right" direction. Last year Mexico race was most prominent showcase of it in recent memory. So, to large extend I agree with you.

There is that. But I was not talking about the fixing of races specifically (evidence of which abounds, btw).

I was referring to the manufacture of a particular type of F1 and the imposition of that particular type of F1 on the collective reality as an absolute necessity.

Consider that the new bosses have but arrived and they are already officiating their "vision" for F1, a "vision" that revolves around a billion-dollar business. It is not about motor-racing. The intention of the standing regulation is to create a TV show where marketing yields incomprehensibly large benefits.

The issue is not that an F1 prototype _might_ cost a large amount. The issue is that an F1 prototype _must_ cost a large amount. How much? Exactly as much as needed to deter true competition so that the entry fee artificially creates a very exclusive club of members, a handful of which will then hugely benefit economically (directly and indirectly) through the advertising of their brands.

Are you in the clothing business and don't know a thing about motor-racing (e.g., Benetton)? Or perhaps intestinal lubricant (e.g., Reb Bull)? No worries, pay these enormous fees and F1 will deliver a global marketplace that only megalomaniacs can dream of.

We don't have the best possible cars and the best possible racing in F1. They are not even trying. What we've got is the cars and racing that these people think will sell the most.

We've got the glitter and glamour of fake sparks.

 

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@maure Interesting take. I have no dissenting opinion to offer, but fact is, that whilst Brawn's initial outline of proposed countermeasures excites me, Bratches/Carey not so much, eyeing commercial plan rather with dose of skepticism. Big words, a lot of big words, but what does that mean at the end? Take for example subject of fees to promote an event. Carey, when he heard that some tracks cannot afford FOM's fees, instead to say OK, we (FOG) lower those, he said (never-mind), we will provide more value for you (whether you have money for it or not). This sets probably a tone for future negotiations. The idea is not to make F1 less expensive, but sell it to more people, and that's how money will be made. 

Prototypes have to remain reasonably sophisticated, its part of the F1 technology charm, but not so much, that majority of paddock have no clue what they are doing.

"Value" - here is that word again, something only in eye of beholder. Cash is something I can count.

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For sure, the interest is on making money, not racing, and their decisions will reflect this.

I have no issue with capitalism and competition. But I understand the difference between business competition and sporting competition and the priorities of each. These folks do not and will whore the "sport" element as if it is unbreakable... until it snaps.

Unsurprisingly, Ecclestone's perennial verbal diarrhea is already conjuring an alternative to F1. Bring it on, I say. What's the harm in more racing? None. Just hook it up to the web, will you old fart?

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Something is telling me, that Ross will not see his five year plan defined, and implemented, and his career with that crowd will be, relatively speaking, short lived.  I do not know substantive details of his proposal, but he is allegedly in favor of imposition of budget cap. I am disappointed, Ross, altho this might be a tactical move on his part to create perception of symmetry with his office buddies, because he knows this issue is (most likely) going exactly nowhere. Strategy Group needs some shaking up at its foundation, because their record for past three years is not really what I would call exemplary.

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They must be lowing Ross to basically do what he wants if he is to come back. As brawn has already said that he would never return to f1 unless it had the freedom it used to have.

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Quote

Brawn praised the commitment of Bernie Ecclestone and the work the 86-year-old Briton did for the sport.

“He is an icon, a unique character. He is absolutely irreplaceable. That is why Formula 1 has been reorganized. I cannot image someone who could manage the sport in the way he did. F1 needed someone like him in his time.

 Ecclestone is irreplaceable. Well, they have replace him, didn't they, and pretty quickly at that.

Ecclestone deserves all accolades -  take it easy with that. Has anyone read conclusion of a summary audit Carey conducted for past 3 months? I have actually, and I have been left with impression, that there was nothing good with F1 or CVC and their man. N********** of worst kind had to go. So, why spray Channel No. 5 all over it when it stinks so badly what he has done?

Brawn was right about one thing - we have to first find out what's wrong with F1 before we start changing it. Seems like a plan, despite being digressing point of view of other 3 Americans (FOG and owner). 

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Legality of sale is questioned - here.

Rightly so, I think. One doesn't has to be part of learned crowd to question legality of F1 sale. I am not a lawyer, and therefore not in a position to state specifics, but there are some weird and unexplained factors in that deal, which seems not to bother neither Americans or Brits, parties involved in the deal. For example to name just one, FiA is supposed to be non profit organization, and their tax system should be corresponding that status, yet what's all that about being a share holder in the series, even if it is 1% or whatever? These days financial sector seems to operate either above the law, or laws baked to their liking, and rest of us pay for it when credit weight blows up into everyone's faces. The question whether Liberty actually has any money on their own in hard cash is really a good one to ask. 

One for posterity, read the other day, second hand car salesman managed to take something which he did not owned in the first place, sold it a few times over, and made millions of it. That's a good one.

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Under new management - is McLaren improving or crumbling? I wonder if recent changes are symptoms of former, and well hidden internal mismanagement at McLaren, or sign of new trend with more to come across the paddock? Not sure that exodus of several front office managers in span of couple of months is an unshakable sign of stability.

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Keep looking at your avatar pic Sakae and sebs helmet, it's so much better design than at his Redbull days don't you think?

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