A year after the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix which gave Max Verstappen his first world title, the bubo of the budget cap burst. Red Bull has violated the financial regulation and, despite this, the penalty inflicted on the team does not seem commensurate with the seriousness of the sentence. The cost ceiling aims to make the fight between the teams fairer, but if the application lacks inflexibility, there will always be someone capable of circumventing the legislator's word to obtain an advantage.
Budget cap summary: the Red Bull crime and the sanctions
The team principal of the team unleashed the media storm Mercedes Toto wolff on the occasion of Singapore Grand Prix. The Austrian manager probably in touch with some element FIA leaking confidential information, revealed a preview of Red Bull's budget cap breach in 2021. A few weeks later, close to the mexican weekend, the Federation found the figure to be $1,8 millionIn short, not quite pocket change when a piece of carbon more or less earns precious thousandths.
The FIA labeled the violation as 'minimal', imposing one penalty in monetary terms, and another in technical terms. The Milton Keynes teamIn fact, will have to pay 7 million dollars of a fine, and will suffer a 10% decrease in wind tunnel time, counting on 1260 hours of tunneling.
Slap or caress, what is the extent of the sanctions?
It is clear that when we speak of a team like Red Bull, whose financial resources are conspicuous, A $7 million fine isn't exactly a TKO blow; it would be different for a team like Haas or Williams. Arrive first rather than second in the league guarantees about eight million more as a prize; so, it might be worth the risk for a team that wants a surplus of about a million. In short, exchanging a penalty as an open door to generate monetary gain is certainly not what Formula 1 should aim for.
As regards the reduction of hours in the tunnel, the sanction probably hurts relatively more. However, Red Bull has already laid very solid foundations for 2023, and it will hardly suffer a backlash able to seat her in favor of Ferrari and Mercedes. It is imperative to note how a reduction of the hours in the tunnel allows engineers to focus on other areas of development, risking degrading the penalty to an 'end in itself'; Speaking of which commented Ferrari sporting director Laurent Mekies.
Too much shaking pulse in budget cap enforcement
The Budget cap has noble ends, and helped in part to approach it. Between these, the objective of bringing the competitiveness between the teams closer together stands out, and this was noted in the increasingly tight fight in the center of the grid. It could even be said that it helped the performance approach between the leading single-seaters: just think that Mercedes at the beginning of the year took 40 seconds from the leaders in the grand prix, and now manages to keep a pace that elevates it to second strength, not very far from Red Bull.
For noble purposes, however, must correspond to greater inflexibility in applying the rules. Cash fines and meager reductions in tunnel hours might do nothing but create precedents, which would allow teams to bring down the Budget cap house of cards. If this mechanism continued to be applied badly, there would be a return to the pre-2021 situation, with very high time gaps. A monetary penalty for a monetary violation is nothing but a more expensive pass in developing a better car, not exactly fair and functional.
A possible solution
To avoid creating dangerous precedents, the FIA could only have one way to protect the image of the premier class of motorsport, and that is reduce points in the drivers' and constructors' standings. An ex post reduction would be inapplicable, considering that the financial statements are reviewed a year later, therefore the only way forward would be to remove points from the standings of the season following the offending one. It may seem unfair as the team may be in good standing this year, but on closer inspection, the advantage acquired in one season violating the spending limit, the following year is also evident. Undermining the standings could be the only way forward if the federation does not increase the penalties, which are far too fragile today.
