FIA President Max Mosley has played down the threat of a split between the FIA and the Formula One Teams Association (FOTA), saying that he fully expects an agreement to be reached over next year’s rules and regulations.
Formula One was thrown into disarray on Friday when the Formula One Teams Association (FOTA), which has been at loggerheads with the FIA over next year’s rules, announced it was planning a breakaway championship series for 2010 – the FIA hit back saying it would begin legal action against the teams if they did so.
Max Mosley has attempted to diffuse the row by affirming his belief that the threat is nothing more than “personalities and posturing”, adding that he expects an agreement to be reached between the two parties shortly.
“They (FOTA) can’t afford not to run in the championship and we would be very reluctant to have a championship without them,” he told the BBC.
“Eventually they will recognise that it can’t happen and it will all come back together.
“Everybody can take a tremendously strong position; I could say that I’m going to win some great sporting event in 2010, but until you actually get there, you can boast all you like.
“In the end people do what it is in their interests to do, and it’s in the interests of teams to be in the championship and there is actually no fundamental or even important issue that is stopping them taking part.
“It’s all personalities and posturing and ‘who can snatch what from who’, but when it actually comes to the first race (of 2010), they’ll be there.”
However, Mosley conceded that the sport could end up losing some of the manufacturer teams as a result of the crisis.
“I think we’ll probably lose one or two, maybe even three manufacturer teams,” he said. “As for the great traditional teams, and I would include Ferrari, they need to be there and they will be there. It will get sorted out.
