The high-profile world that is Formula One racing is in a deep financial crisis and nobody seems to have a clue of how to fix it. Sunday’s U.S. F1 Grand Prix saw only 18 drivers take the grid after Caterham and Marussia both went into administration and were forced to skip the race to deal with their individual issues. Talks regarding reducing the costs of competing in F1 have been ongoing for several years. However, the teams have been unable to agree on introducing such measures. And judging by Friday’s team principal press conference, they might be further apart than ever before. The discontent was clearly visible, with Lotus’ Gerard Lopez, Sauber’s Monisha Kaltenborn and Force India’s Vijay Mallya making their pleas for the need of reducing costs, while Mercedes’ Toto Wolff and McLaren’s Eric Boullier held firm in their beliefs that there should not be any spending limit. One of the major sticking points is F1’s current revenue distribution model. Mallya: “I’ve always said that the model has to be more equitable. The commercial rights holder is entitled to make its profit by owning the commercial rights for the sport, and as far as the distribution is concerned, I think Gerard [Lopez] very clearly explained that it was skewed mainly towards the big teams which is basically what is causing the problem with the smaller teams.”
SAVING THE SPORT: With the big teams not willing to voluntarily give up this extra income, the smaller teams called on F1’s commercial rights holder and FIA to come up with a solution, or as Kaltenborn said, F1 could eventually end up with only four participants with an endless amount of cars. She added, "If we don’t act now together then you have to ask yourself what else needs to still happen?" In an interview with the PA, F1 CEO Bernie Ecclestone said that he knows what is wrong but does not know how to fix it. He blamed regulations that tie the hands of the sport’s stakeholders to help the struggling teams. Ecclestone added that the situation can be resolved if simply enough people want to resolve it. He said, “It's a case that the people involved in the sport will have to want to look after the sport and be prepared to make some sacrifices." Herein lies the current problem. The smaller teams are willing to make sacrifices and look after the sport. However, their voices are not as powerful as those of a Mercedes, Red Bull or Ferrari.
