World Council to Vote on F1 Future Tomorrow

The future shape of Formula One will be formed in Paris on Wednesday when the World Motor Sport Council meets to rubber stamp plans to change the regulations for the second year in succession.

Team bosses have met numerous times in the last month to argue out their suggestions for the format in 2004 and will make further changes despite calls for rules stability following major modifications to the Championship this year.

The Formula One Commission, which involves race promoters as well as Grand Prix teams, voted for the proposals in a meeting before last weekend's season-ending Japanese Grand Prix but they now need to be accepted by the Council.

If they are given the green light then the single-lap qualifying sessions run on Fridays and Saturdays, which were introduced this year, will be retained but crammed into Saturday to leave Friday as a free practice day for all the teams.

The two-hour private testing session, which four teams opted for this season, will be scrapped. But some of the smaller teams claim that will be a disaster and Minardi boss Paul Stoddart said: "It is not good for us and it's very sad. Formula One has transformed itself in 12 months and now we change it all again.

"Last year there was much talk about initiatives to the small teams and the two hours on a Friday morning enormously helped the small teams. It's been taken away. What it has been replaced with doesn't really help the small teams."

If the changes are accepted then all teams except this year's top four - Ferrari, Williams-BMW, McLaren-Mercedes and Renault - will be allowed to test an additional car on Fridays which can be run with a different livery if required.

The Friday test sessions have been used by some teams this year to run young pay drivers but now those drivers will require a superlicence, which Stoddart claims would have prevented two of the drivers he has used this year from competing.

It also means that the top teams will be able to test on Fridays while still being allowed 48 test days for as many cars and at as many tracks as they want rather than the 20 car days currently allowed to those testing on Fridays.

McLaren boss Ron Dennis, however, believes the changes would actually help the smaller teams.

"There seemed to be an incredible naivety amongst some of the team principals who were arguing for testing and refused to listen," Dennis said. "If it continued some of the big teams would have adopted it and that would nullify any advantage the smaller teams had as well as escalating costs because the top teams would bring dedicated mechanics, cars and particularly engines."

The teams have already agreed to use one engine per car per weekend next season, a significant change which will not only reduce costs but should also reduce speeds because engines will have to last longer.

If the Friday testing continued as a private session teams could use another engine and Dennis argued: "It would effectively turn the one engine formula into a two engine formula again. That defeats the object."