WB, for once I agree with you. That is exactly what FOTA should do. Play hardball. They owe BCE nothing except a good thrashing. Earlier he was trying to jam his "wins only medal" system down their throats in total disregard for their opinions. Then, when FOM and the FIA were forced to delay for a year due to their own statutes, BCE had the nerve to lie to the media and say incredulously... "I was under the impression that all the teams were for it". So the issue of sound governance extends beyond MM.WhiteBlue wrote:CVC are the majority owner. Bernie retains a small equity share supposedly and there are some shares by past owners which are owned by banks. It is clear that CVC has the control. The important point is that the business is highly leveraged by huge debts. Those schemes only work when there is reasonable safety for future profits that enable payment of interest and reduction of debt. If Bernie decides to give half the profit away (which is probably a minimum of what the FOTA wants) FOA/FOM would immediately loose the securities to most of their debt and go bust.
Of course FOTA are aware of this and the only logical step from their side is to negotiate from this position of strength. They have Bernie more by the bollocks than they have Max Mosley. Thats why Bernie is probably telling Max to stuff it. FOTA have several options. They can push FOA/FOM into receivership and take over the commercial rights for pocket change or use that stick to get concessions and equity transfer. The logical thing that would make it cheap for them is to let FOA/FOM fail and leave the banks saddled with the bad debts.
Now what I think FOTA should do is make a deal with Williams and Force India that goes like this.... You two teams run year old token cars with Cosworth power in the FIA go-cart series on a budget of $500K/yr. with full FOTA/GPWC livery and we will pay you what the Cosworths cost as team title sponsors. Fulfill the bare minimum of your contract with the FIA. We will not let our engines race in the FIA series and will buy out our contracts for the cost of the contract. Would you like to race real competitors and real cars in the FOTA series or not?
This way if all ten teams of the current grid migrate to a different regime, albeit a self governing one, there will not be a "split"... it will just be a shuffling of the chairs with the whole racing part of the sport intact. This is very important for promotional considerations as it would certainly drive the final nail in the FIA/FOM coffin. BTW, I don't think they would have to follow through on much of this as the FIA series would likely be canceled having no consequential teams.
The same offer could be made to USF1... some FOTA teams could supply them with an old chassis (and I mean just the tub) so they could cob together a skeleton car to fulfill the bare minimum of any obligations they have to the FIA and then do a sweet heart engine deal for them to join the FOTA series.
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