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Todt wants to expand F1 grid to 12 teams instead of 10

Todt wants to expand F1 grid to 12 teams instead of 10

11-03-2019 14:30
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Bobby Vincent

FIA president Jean Todt has revealed he wants to increase the number of teams that compete in Formula 1 to 12, but he faces conflict from the current competitors.

For the third successive season, F1 will operate with 10 teams on its grid - and it begins this weekend in Australia. 

In an interview with Sky Sports F1 last week, the FIA president admitted he wants to add two more teams to the grid but described it as a "long debate".

"It's always a long debate," Todt explained. "At the moment, we have 10 stable teams. As you know we are talking together with the commercial rights holder (Liberty Media), with the teams, about the renewal of the Concorde Agreement (beyond) 2020. And we are considering a lot of things.

"Of course, for me, I think it would be better to have 12 teams. If you speak about that to the actual team principals, they are not very happy about that because of course it will change financial distribution, so it will be different for them. But it's part of the discussion."

Todt also hinted that the Formula One Management group want to expand the grid as well: "At the end of the day, the most important (thing) is not so much the number of teams, it's the quality of the team and the quality of the show.

"So that's something we do fully agree together with Formula 1, with Chase Carey, with his team and we are working very closely together."