Winter drama changing the face of F1

The repercussions of last week's drama, when it was not only confirmed from Munich that Formula 1 tsar Bernie Ecclestone had been charged with bribery and associated deeds, but that Ron Dennis would reassume overall operational responsibility for McLaren, loomed over events in Geneva this week.

Three meetings were called to shape, respectively, the long, medium and short-term futures of the sport.

The line-up at those meetings revealed plenty about the behind-closed-doors intrigue that was already public knowledge, and what was still to come.

Jean Todt © XPB

FIA president Jean Todt, who has long beaten the cost-cutting drum, called Wednesday morning's team meeting in early January.

Significantly, though, it was only after Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo indicated during the Scuderia's annual Christmas media lunch that he planned to call a team summit to discuss various issues - including costs, the question of third cars and the idiotic double-points structure - that Todt leapt into action.

At that stage only those teams who had 'officially entered' the 2014 championship, for which read teams who had paid up their entry fees in full, were invited to Geneva, and the fact that both Lotus and Marussia made the journey suggests they eventually coughed up.

Indeed, sources indicate that both paid their fees late last week, having previously been asterisked on the provisional entry list.

With all team principals (or substitutes) present in Geneva, Ecclestone considered it prudent to call a Strategy Group meeting, particularly as Todt had scheduled an extraordinary session of the World Motor Sport Council for Thursday, also in Geneva.

There was, though, a slight problem, for the procedure agreed between the FIA and all teams in Paris in October 2012 as precursor to a replacement Concorde Agreement being signed was that the (six-team) Strategy Group would frame regulations and pass these to the (25-strong) Formula 1 Commission for approval, before being escalated to the WMSC for ratification.

Spot the missing link? No problem: F1 has a habit of making things up as it goes along. In December, the WMSC meeting was held before the Strategy Group meeting, with the WMSC mandating Todt to ratify motions, so the absence of an F1 Commission meeting was absolutely no impediment, for motions were passed directly to the WMSC, but subject to Formula 1 Commission approval.

So with eight weeks to go before F1's 2014 season opener, the sporting and technical regulations are still in need of final approval.

For the record, details of the preliminary 2014 sporting/technical regulation changes are available here and here.

Significantly, Wednesday morning's meeting was attended by Donald Mackenzie, co-founder and chairman of CVC Capital Partners, but that was to be expected, for it is in keeping with CVC's statement that Ecclestone would be subject to "increased monitoring and control by the board" due to the Munich decision.

Ron Dennis (in the black coat in the background) has turned McLaren around once and is returning to try again © LAT

Incidentally, that statement made abundantly clear where CVC's priorities lie, for when referring to "the best interests" of Formula 1 as an entity, it referred to "business" first and "sport" second... Any wonder that F1's on-track issues are totally overwhelmed by commercial considerations?

But if Mackenzie's presence was significant, conspicuous was the absence of McLaren CEO and team principal (and FOTA chairman) Martin Whitmarsh, whose place was taken by the duo of sporting director Sam Michael and financial director John Cooper, the architect of the controversial Resource Restriction Agreement matrix.

No official reason was forwarded for Whitmarsh's absence, but those who understand the politics raging within the McLaren Group at present know that none is needed, for under the former British Aerospace engineer the team in 2013 suffered its worst season since Dennis took over McLaren's helm in the 1980s.

It cannot be coincidental that Dennis has wrested back control of the team, nor that rumours of Whitmarsh's redeployment hit the internet immediately after Dennis announced his comeback.

Whitmarsh, arguably too decent a man to be responsible for a frontrunning F1 team, is said to be moved sideways to head up the McLaren Group's Applied Technologies division, which is growing in leaps and bounds, and is believed to have taken McLaren Electronic Systems under its wing.

But according to sources, Eric Boullier, in Geneva on behalf of the struggling Lotus operation, was in a rather withdrawn mode, and thus possibly knew a thing or two about McLaren and its manpower reshuffles, for it is most unlike the Frenchman to be slow in coming forward during meetings.

Indeed, sources within Lotus indicate he had earlier resigned after failing to secure a long-term contract in the wake of the team's ongoing difficulties, and thus it was no surprise to learn that co-chairman Gerard Lopez on Friday announced he had appointed himself team principal, leaving the way open for McLaren to swoop for Boullier.

Another to be (allegedly) rather subdued was Franz Tost, team boss of Toro Rosso, but with the Austrian having previously been vocal about cost cuts - which would, of course, affect the competitiveness of big sister Red Bull Racing - you wonder whether his silence was not so much due to any pending career adjustment as being advised by his paymasters to take a back seat during discussions, particularly as RBR's team principal Christian Horner invariably voices opposition to most proposed measures.

Eric Boullier looks set to head McLaren © XPB

Mackenzie is said to have to have been in favour of cost controls, ostensibly for reasons of equality and competitiveness. This is apart from the fact that he would, as a trained accountant, favour cost cuts simply because any reduction in team spending would reduce pressure from them for increased slices of F1's billion-dollar annual revenues.

But Mackenzie's stance (conveniently) overlooks the fact that, ultimately, the number cruncher agreed to pay Red Bull, Ferrari, McLaren, Mercedes and Williams for their participation through to 2020.

Also present on Wednesday was Jean-Louis Valentin, the Frenchman the incoming (on February 1) replacement for Pierre de Coninck, the FIA's secretary general for sport.

Belgian-born de Coninck, a former saloon car racer, joined the federation in 1992 - immediately after Max Mosley assumed full control of the body - and a year ago asked to step down to concentrate on family matters. In typical Todt fashion the transition to Valentin, a former French football official, has been handled elegantly.

Now, back to cost cuts: one source termed the talks "a step in the right direction, but only a single step...", suggesting that not only does a long road lie ahead, but that any imposed cap could lie in the vicinity of $200 million per year.

Such a cap would still mean a 50 per cent reduction in budgets (and headcounts) for major teams, a move Montezemolo expressed himself in favour of in order to ensure the long-term future of Formula 1.

Still, Ferrari or Red Bull would still have larger portions of their budgets covered by F1's revenues than do smaller teams despite more modest expenditure, and until such inequality is resolved, F1 simply cannot claim to be a true sport regardless of cooing noises from Todt, Mackenzie or Montezemolo.

Equally, a $200m cap still comfortably exceeds the budget of such as Lotus, for the past four years (incurring a $150m debt mountain in the process), let alone Sauber, Force India, Toro Rosso and Williams, while Caterham and Marussia battle to make ends met on less than half that.

As part of the cost-cutting discussion the question of customer cars versus third cars was debated, and again no clear-cut agreement was reached, with arguments raging back and forth.

Team principals welcomed the interest shown by Mackenzie, for his interaction with F1 has been sporadic to say the least, despite CVC's purchase of the sport's commercial rights being arguably the most profitable transaction in the company's 30-year history.

Where fans hoped the daft decision to award double points for the season finale would be rescinded, sources advise that Ecclestone brooked no discussion, stating it would be tried this year, full stop.

So much for paying heed to the sport's "customer" base; equally, Ecclestone is master of illusion, so it arguably suits him to keep controversy going as it deflects attention from the current turmoil in his life.