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[Ferrari man 009]

Don't know if anyone watched the Team Principals Press Conference but I thought it was very interesting and it was interesting to see the differing views of Kaltenborn/Mallaya/Lopez compared to Boullier and Wolff.

The best comment was Lopez stating that spending $300m (£200m) to only be 6 seconds faster than a GP2 car spending $3m (£2m) is terrible value for money.

I thought it would be good to have a thread to discuss ideas to make F1 fairer for all teams, while acknowledging that the bigger/better teams will generate more money and spend more than the less successful/smaller teams.

Personally I would make 2 changes to start:

1) All TV money should be distributed evenly between all teams - this money isnt performance related so I do think its unfair that Ferrari/RBR get more than Marussia/Caterham. Prize money should still be scaled depending on success but the steps should be evenly balanced (e.g. £10m for the winner, £9m for 2nd, £8m for 3rd...).

2) I would ban in-season developments. The car you turn up to the first race with is the car you race for the rest of the season. Obviously you can replace worn/broken parts but only for identical replacements. I would expect that this would immediately cut costs and be fairer to the smaller teams that can't afford to develop their cars like McLaren/Ferrari/RBR have this season (Force India have gone from 2nd/3rd fastest to 6th fastest purely by being out developed).

[LRW]

The issue with banning in season development is you'd get even more one team dominated seasons.

[What's Burning?]

If we want the real deal, as it's been said. Limit only the fuel source and give the teams the physical dimensions a car has to fit into and let them go. The current culture is the big teams know that keeping the dollar value high decreases competition. It's at lease a constant that you will have three or four competitors and the rest are also rans.

Basketball wouldn't ban tall people from playing like F1 wouldn't implement cost caps.

[darwin dali]

If we want the real deal, as it's been said. Limit only the fuel source and give the teams the physical dimensions a car has to fit into and let them go. The current culture is the big teams know that keeping the dollar value high decreases competition. It's at lease a constant that you will have three or four competitors and the rest are also rans.

Basketball wouldn't ban tall people from playing like F1 wouldn't implement cost caps.

Maybe not ban tall people, but F1's players definitely play with an iron ball while wearing lead shoes (Ferrari being partial to cement shoes ).

[Jabberwocky]

With the bigger bite of the TV money, I just see all the teams just spending more.

Maybe there should be a set cost for customer teams. Who can buy 1 year old kits from the bigger teams.

Engines 20mil
Gearbox 5 mil
Aero 5 mil
Chassis 10 mil

Maybe introduce that all the connections and hookups are standard so that a customer teams could pitch up and say

I want merc engine, Williams chassis, with red bull aero. Here is the cash, great let's go racing

[What's Burning?]

With the bigger bite of the TV money, I just see all the teams just spending more.

Maybe there should be a set cost for customer teams. Who can buy 1 year old kits from the bigger teams.

Engines 20mil
Gearbox 5 mil
Aero 5 mil
Chassis 10 mil

Maybe introduce that all the connections and hookups are standard so that a customer teams could pitch up and say

I want merc engine, Williams chassis, with red bull aero. Here is the cash, great let's go racing

An a la carte spec series... I like it.

[darwin dali]

With the bigger bite of the TV money, I just see all the teams just spending more.

Maybe there should be a set cost for customer teams. Who can buy 1 year old kits from the bigger teams.

Engines 20mil
Gearbox 5 mil
Aero 5 mil
Chassis 10 mil

Maybe introduce that all the connections and hookups are standard so that a customer teams could pitch up and say

I want merc engine, Williams chassis, with red bull aero. Here is the cash, great let's go racing

One year old? These components don't even last more than 4 races!
j/k - know what you mean.

[sagi58]

...All TV money should be distributed evenly between all teams - this money isnt performance related so I do think its unfair that Ferrari/RBR get more than Marussia/Caterham. Prize money should still be scaled depending on success but the steps should be evenly balanced (e.g. £10m for the winner, £9m for 2nd, £8m for 3rd...)...

I agree with monies generated being more equitably distributed; but, why stop at TV income?
F1 makes all sorts of money from advertisers on their website and there must be profits from
the actual venues... why shouldn't these monies also shared amongst the teams?

[Ferrari man 009]

...All TV money should be distributed evenly between all teams - this money isnt performance related so I do think its unfair that Ferrari/RBR get more than Marussia/Caterham. Prize money should still be scaled depending on success but the steps should be evenly balanced (e.g. £10m for the winner, £9m for 2nd, £8m for 3rd...)...

I agree with monies generated being more equitably distributed; but, why stop at TV income?
F1 makes all sorts of money from advertisers on their website and there must be profits from
the actual venues... why shouldn't these monies also shared amongst the teams?

Apologies, you are right. I should have said commercial revenue. I dont mind Ferrari spending more than Caterham because they get more money from sponsors or more prize money, but all teams should get the same amount of money for turning up.

Also, if the big teams want technological changes (which are important) then they should subsidise costs for the smaller (customer) teams.

[LRW]

....there must be profits from the actual venues... why shouldn't these monies also shared amongst the teams?

Because the race track owners who paid £20M just for the privilege of hosting a race might want to get a bit of that back ?

[Hammer278]

IMO 3 cars is almost a certainty at this stage. But can it be incorporated for 2015? I think the old Gnome will somehow push the paper work through and teams will be forced to shell out for the 3rd car. Although this might also spell the death of Lotus and possibly Sauber. Toro Rosso could soldier on since the have big daddy's pockets and Redbull Inc will have SIX cars representing them in F1! No harm with more marketing avenues in the pinnacle of F1.

[Jabberwocky]

Does fielding a 3rd car really cost the teams that much extra? They used to have T-Cars so it is not impossible

[sagi58]

....there must be profits from the actual venues... why shouldn't these monies also shared amongst the teams?

Because the race track owners who paid £20M just for the privilege of hosting a race might want to get a bit of that back ?

Agreed! I assumed that Ecclestone, et al get some of that and that they could share with the teams, too, no?

[CookinFlat6]

The hosting fees from each circuit goes into the FOM revenue of which about half is then paid out to the teams along with the other major component, the TV income. So the revenue from the track owners is already subject to 50% siphoned off for Bernies TOPCO with a further percentage off the top given to Ferrari, before the rest is subject to the tranche formula dictating what percentage each team gets

In other successful and healthy sporting series, those revenues would be split amongst the teams without Ferrari or FOM receiving a portion that is not related to performance. As far as TV revenues go, the spilt is meant to take into account the table position and hence the probably airtime of each team

[CigarGuy]

The only thing I can remotely compare to is Football. English Premier Leagur splits TV revenues evenly, La Liga(Spain)
does not. I think everyone agrees that that EPL is more balanced, top to bottom, then La Liga, and much "healthier"?!