Joe wonders if the FIA is going the FIFA way, which is to say putting its back pocket before the good of the sport...
I don’t understand the FIA. They have a rulebook, and sometimes they impose the rules to the tightest possible degree – imposing daft engine penalties on McLaren in Austria, for example, which make a mockery of the entire system. On other occasions they simply ignore the rules if it doesn’t suit them to follow what’s written in the rulebook. How can people respect a governing body that only uses the rules it wants to use?
The FIA Formula 1 Sporting Regulations for 2015 say: “The maximum number of Events in the Championship is 20.” This clause is even included in the very last version of the rules, which was published as recently as the 10th of July – the day of the last meeting of the FIA World Motor Sport Council. On the same day, the Federation announced a calendar that features 21 races. No explanation is offered, and no one seems to be in the least bit bothered that the organisation is breaking its own rules. It’s very clear why this is happening – there’s a huge whack of money involved in having an extra race. But it would be nice if the Federation would adopt some clear thinking and change the regulations, instead of turning a blind eye and looking like a bunch of bunch of amateur, second-hand car dealers who don’t mind cutting corners for “a nice little earner.”
The thing is that attitudes in the world are changing towards international sporting bodies. People are fed up with the kind of behaviour that has been typified over the years by FIFA, and change is coming. It’s wise for the FIA to make changes before someone comes in and tells them to smarten up their act. If everyone wants 21 races in 2016, then that’s fine – but at least change the rules to reflect that. Perhaps there are allowances for all of this in the secret bilateral agreements that exist between the Formula One group and the F1 teams, but that’s not much good to anyone. And how ridiculous is it that a sport has rules that are secret. How does that work? What good can possibly come from keeping the rules and regulations out of the public domain? It just makes the Federation and all concerned look as though they have something to hide. Perhaps they do, perhaps they do not, but why court trouble when you don’t need it. Transparency never hurt anyone who was playing by the rules. Transparency is what car manufacturers and big sponsors like in this day and age.
An additional race will add extra costs for all of those who travel to the races, but it will also mean that they will earn more money (at least in theory). And it’s not negligible money. If the government of Azerbaijan is paying the kind of money that’s required for F1 to visit such a backwater, and Germany is paying as much as it can afford, the additional fees that’ll be generated will be in the region of $75 million. There will be other earnings on top of that, although it’s not clear how these mechanisms work with F1’s biggest sponsors. About half the money will go to the Commercial Rights Holder, which will probably shove it into a fund that will form the next dividend – sucking yet more money out of the sport. The other half of the money will go to the teams, which means that they’ll get a million (or three) extra. It all helps. The reason that the FIA is so happy to break its own rules is that it’ll receive an additional $1 million in regulatory fees. What I don’t understand is that this is pretty much akin to putting a large ‘For Sale’ sign on the door of the FIA offices in the Place de la Concorde!
The other question that one must ask is what is the possible value of hosting a race in Azerbaijan – a country of no real strategic importance in terms of global markets. Yes, it’s pumping oil and gas out of the ground in huge quantities – and, as a result, some in the country (let’s not go into too much detail) are getting very rich. Now they have money, they also want respectability and are willing to pay so that the race is called the European Grand Prix.
Azerbaijan is not Europe. There may be some geographical arguments about the Urals and the Caucasus mountains, but that doesn’t make the place European. Culturally, it’s Turkic with a majority of Shia Muslims. However, it suits the Formula One group to claim European status for the new event and if no one challenges that, then European it is. One also wonders whether the FIA ought not be asking questions about whether or not it’s good for its primary asset, F1, to be seen going to a country that has a poor reputation for human rights and corruption.
Joe Saward has been covering Formula 1 full-time for 27 years. He has not missed a race since 1988.
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