Todt aiming to expand grid to 12 teams
- Published on 11 Mar 2019 14:37
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- By: Fergal Walsh
FIA president Jean Todt is pushing to add two more teams to the Formula 1 grid, but is facing challenges from current competitors.
F1 last raced with 12 teams in 2014, as Caterham dropped away from the field following the maiden year in the turbo hybrid era.
Haas' arrival in F1 in 2016 brought the grid up to 11 teams, before Manor collapsed prior to the 2017 season, reducing the field top 10 teams once more.
"It’s always a long debate,” he said. “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 added that he has the support of Liberty Media, F1's current commercial rights holders.
“At the end of the day the most important 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.”
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Replies (4)
Login to replycalle.itw
Posts: 8,527
Lookie here who woke up to make a statement. Well, 10 teams yes, but stable, they are not. I think e.g Williams is a good example of some degree of unstability, as are apparently about 5/10 teams.
Danimal5981
Posts: 574
I think a state funded team from China was on the cards and it would be great to see something from Brazilian soil - a country with strong F1 heritage and a relatively uncontested market.
Pistonhead
Posts: 556
12 Teams is th way to go, and once again squabbling could prevent the right thing being done for the viewing spectacle. If the teams are worried about financial distribution, then this is another pointer to the finances being wrong in the sport NOW, Liberty have to fox this issue at the same time as asking new teams to come on board. A state owned team is not a good idea - China has more money than god and that surely isn't the right answer either, unless the agreement comes with spending caps.
Vet5
Posts: 225
No danger that will happen! They are struggling to keep races on the calendar never mind teams, Williams is going to pot, McLaren are struggling, they are so full of s**t its unreal