Nigel Roebuck: Fifth Column

One of the decisions taken at last week's meeting of the FIA's World Motor Sport Council will have been received in very different ways. If you are an F1 team principal or engineer - or perhaps even driver - your response will have been, at best, unenthusiastic. If you are a fan, you may have felt inclined to crack open a bottle of Bollinger. As of the beginning of 2008, traction control... drum roll... is banned!

The move has been approved (if not approved of) by all the teams, and perhaps the trade-off has been for the FIA to shed other possible changes for '08, such as wider cars and a return to slicks. The governing body had also planned to reduce the minimum weight of the cars, from 605kg to 550kg, but that idea too has been shelved, which surprises me, I must say, for Bernie Ecclestone was much in favour of it.