Saturday, March 17, 2012

Politics on Resource Restriction Agreement

The Formula One Teams Association (FOTA) has collapsed due to disagreement over the voluntary Resource Restriction Agreement that was agreed upon by the FOTA members. It was reported that Red Bull had spent much more than other teams in order to be competitive and win the championship.

There was no unanimity among the FOTA members on this issue as Red Bull and its sister firm Scuderia Torro Rosso didn't agree to the Resource Restriction Agreement (RRA). So barring Red Bull and Torro Rosso, other momembers of the now defunct FOTA have written to the FIA to implement it. They have asked for implenting penalty to teams who violate this agreement by either docking points or deducting grid places ie. pushing them down the starting grid in races. This move is seen to put pressure on Red Bull.

It would be pertinent to mention that HRT had pulled out of FOTA as it didn't want to even pay the membership fees of FOTA and also because it thought FOTA is for the interests of big teams.

When smaller teams are struggling to cobble together the required finances, it becomes difficult for them to compete with other teams who spend much more than them. Naturally, the successful teams attract much more sponsorships than the smaller teams. So it is a vicious cycle as well.

Let us wait for FIA to respond to this request for implementing the RRA. 

2 comments:

Deepak Karthik said...

That's the law right ? That's how system works...
We need money to compete, but money flows freely to the winning team compared to the rest of the team.
Thanks for the info !

ArjunaUbacha said...

Deepak,
You are right. Money will flow to the winning team as the cameras focus more on the winning team and hence you get more airtime. This is apart from the money that the top 10 finishers get. I wonder why the TATA's are not buying a team like HRT and completely revamping and rebranding it as Jaguar.