FIA Thread

[chrisc90]

I also wonder when we are going to start to see the cost cap being properly discussed.

Or whether the FIA have learned from last year about little insider leaks to other teams - So we might just end up with the overall result of which teams were in adherence and which werent, if any.

[vorticism]

Is building road cars a "side project?" Is selling fizzy drinks a side project? CNC milling machines?

"The court hears you were running CFD sims, quote 'because it's a hobby of mine,' while on vacation in Majorca, do you deny this?"

I do not see how a rule can be backdated?

While they're at it, can they also backdate the oil burning rules? That might give RB a few more WCCs and some decent reperatory prize money millions.

[AR3-GP]

I also wonder when we are going to start to see the cost cap being properly discussed.

Or whether the FIA have learned from last year about little insider leaks to other teams - So we might just end up with the overall result of which teams were in adherence and which werent, if any.

The "wrong" teams are under fire. That's why their are no leaks

[Tiny73]

?

Mercedes sent Adrian Newey a job offer. Would that be cheating? Adrian has been allowed to develop his own ideas using millions of dollars in RB resources. Should Merc be able to hire him away for the cost of his salary, so he can regurgitate an RB19 for them with a substantially reduced R&D cost?

You’re right, he should be chained to a desk at RB until such time they’ve sucked him dry of ideas and inspiration. Heaven forbid he seek a new challenge, how very dare he?

Adrian Newey is only being used as an example. Do you have any opinion of the rest of the post which is the much more interesting discussion point?

If F1's goal is to prevent teams from circumventing the cost cap, then hiring employees from rival teams would need to be policed. Whether that means Adrian Newey is chained to a desk at RB or not, it's a question that must be answered, if only to expose the inconvenient conclusions which is presents. This may just prove that the cost cap is a fool's errand.

As I pointed out in the original post, AMR bought tons of IP for pennies on the dollar by simply paying a salary to heavily embedded employees of rival teams. Why is this overlooked? Is this not a blatant circumvention of the cost cap? They've gained access to ideas and technology that they did not have to account for in their budget because it came by way of the minds of the people they hired. People like Blandin and Fellows may have spent millions in R&D at RB and Mercedes to develop methodology, aerodynamic understandings, etc, and could show up at AMR with the final results of that R&D in their heads to regurgitate for Lawrence Stroll. Do you think that's not what is being done and why Lawrence went after these people in the first place?

I’m sorry but what is your point? That Mercedes (or any other team for that matter) cannot hire an individual with intimate knowledge of design of the team they’re coming from?

What you’re proposing is, in effect penury. “You cannot leave because you have intimate knowledge of the team you’re coming from”?

Genuine question, if you believe that people can’t be hired because they have knowledge of a team then what you’re proposing is a static job market? I’ve been hired in multiple roles because of my experience (and knowledge) and what experience I can bring to an organisation from my previous experience (with adaptation of course).

I may be misunderstanding you (and apologies if that’s the case) but it feels like what you’re proposing is that successful people cannot move because they’re successful and that’s against the cost cap principles? (FWIW I think the cost cap is a joke, RB proved that last year, slap on the wrist and gains built in for years but that’s just my opinion and frankly I have many others, equally invalid )

(Incidentally, I’m not looking for a fight, I’m genuinely interested how the movement of personnel between teams could, or more importantly, should, be policed?)

[Just_a_fan]

Does seem odd it can be backdated. If a team was using IP by a side project, how do you assign the value of it? Would be very hard to do surely. What if a team has already thrown a tonne of resources into that project since 1st January and then FIA comes along and says that's worth £50million for example and throws the team over the cap not even half way through the season.

Side projects will continue. I mean take Red Bull for example. How many different teams, or other areas of extreme sports do they sponsor or have their branding attached to - absolutely loads. Stunts, boats, motorcross, rallying.

Side projects are fine. What is not fine is using them to get around the cost cap. That's when a side project becomes cheating.

Hiring employees from other teams is a way to get around the cost cap. You can hire an engineer with his head full of concepts which another team invested in, which he can regurgitate in a week, vs the months of time and millions of R&D cost it might take your team to develop the same idea organically.

Is this cheating? Did AMR cheat when they hired Blandin, Fallows, and the others?

Mercedes sent Adrian Newey a job offer. Would that be cheating? Adrian has been allowed to develop his own ideas using millions of dollars in RB resources. Should Merc be able to hire him away for the cost of his salary, so he can regurgitate an RB19 for them with a substantially reduced R&D cost?

There is no way to prevent people moving between teams. However, people moving between a Red Bull R&D firm and the Red Bull F1 team can be controlled.

Of course, Red Bull did it very cleverly when they used a project for another company to put a huge amount of R&D in to ground effect tunnel cars.

[Just_a_fan]

I also wonder when we are going to start to see the cost cap being properly discussed.

Or whether the FIA have learned from last year about little insider leaks to other teams - So we might just end up with the overall result of which teams were in adherence and which werent, if any.

The "wrong" teams are under fire. That's why their are no leaks

Or the other teams are, like last year, all under the cost cap limit and so there is nothing to leak. Maybe even Red Bull have figured out how to account for sandwiches in the cost cap this year.

[AR3-GP]

You’re right, he should be chained to a desk at RB until such time they’ve sucked him dry of ideas and inspiration. Heaven forbid he seek a new challenge, how very dare he?

Adrian Newey is only being used as an example. Do you have any opinion of the rest of the post which is the much more interesting discussion point?

If F1's goal is to prevent teams from circumventing the cost cap, then hiring employees from rival teams would need to be policed. Whether that means Adrian Newey is chained to a desk at RB or not, it's a question that must be answered, if only to expose the inconvenient conclusions which is presents. This may just prove that the cost cap is a fool's errand.

As I pointed out in the original post, AMR bought tons of IP for pennies on the dollar by simply paying a salary to heavily embedded employees of rival teams. Why is this overlooked? Is this not a blatant circumvention of the cost cap? They've gained access to ideas and technology that they did not have to account for in their budget because it came by way of the minds of the people they hired. People like Blandin and Fellows may have spent millions in R&D at RB and Mercedes to develop methodology, aerodynamic understandings, etc, and could show up at AMR with the final results of that R&D in their heads to regurgitate for Lawrence Stroll. Do you think that's not what is being done and why Lawrence went after these people in the first place?

I’m sorry but what is your point? That Mercedes (or any other team for that matter) cannot hire an individual with intimate knowledge of design of the team they’re coming from?

What you’re proposing is, in effect penury. “You cannot leave because you have intimate knowledge of the team you’re coming from”?

Genuine question, if you believe that people can’t be hired because they have knowledge of a team then what you’re proposing is a static job market? I’ve been hired in multiple roles because of my experience (and knowledge) and what experience I can bring to an organisation from my previous experience (with adaptation of course).

I may be misunderstanding you (and apologies if that’s the case) but it feels like what you’re proposing is that successful people cannot move because they’re successful and that’s against the cost cap principles? (FWIW I think the cost cap is a joke, RB proved that last year, slap on the wrist and gains built in for years but that’s just my opinion and frankly I have many others, equally invalid )

(Incidentally, I’m not looking for a fight, I’m genuinely interested how the movement of personnel between teams could, or more importantly, should, be policed?)

I don't think that people can't be hired, because they already "know things". I'm just presenting the similarity between the issue for which TD54 (?) addresses, and the matter of hiring people who have ideas in their head for which no cost can be tied to them. It just proves you can't actually make a team properly account for ideas. After all, AMR couldn't dream of fitting under the cap, what they got for free by hiring Blandin and Fallows. It's a giant hole in what the cost cap hoped to achieve. Now the way to access millions of dollars of R&D knowledge, for pennies on the dollar, is to head hunt at RB, Mercedes, and Ferrari...

[AR3-GP]

Side projects are fine. What is not fine is using them to get around the cost cap. That's when a side project becomes cheating.

Hiring employees from other teams is a way to get around the cost cap. You can hire an engineer with his head full of concepts which another team invested in, which he can regurgitate in a week, vs the months of time and millions of R&D cost it might take your team to develop the same idea organically.

Is this cheating? Did AMR cheat when they hired Blandin, Fallows, and the others?

Mercedes sent Adrian Newey a job offer. Would that be cheating? Adrian has been allowed to develop his own ideas using millions of dollars in RB resources. Should Merc be able to hire him away for the cost of his salary, so he can regurgitate an RB19 for them with a substantially reduced R&D cost?

There is no way to prevent people moving between teams. However, people moving between a Red Bull R&D firm and the Red Bull F1 team can be controlled.

So in other words, there are two holes in this sinking ship. We can patch one of them and make it "look" like this is salvageable, but it was always doomed to fail. That's essentially my point. You will never get a proper accounting of "IP" and good luck trying to establish what "IP" is. A head full of ideas learned at one team, is worth R&D for pennies on the dollar to another team. Why do you think Mclaren could afford to send a big dollar offer to Marshall? Or that Lawrence Stroll could buy lead engineers from Mercedes and RB with impunity? They are not just paying a salary, they are purchasing millions of dollars worth of methodology and technology know-how. Suddenly a 2 million dollar salary under the cap is worth 20 million of actual R&D. In a nutshell it represents what Mercedes would like to do by hiring Adrian Newey. Have him regurgitate a RB for pennies on the dollar.

Philosophically, I don't think the cap is working as intended. You simply cannot properly account for the cost of ideas. Whether they come from a team's applied sciences sister company, or they come from a different team entirely by way of head hunting.

With all that said, the teams don't care because they are turning profits regardless of how high or low they finishing in the standings. They will never go back to unlimited spending.

[lio007]

Take it with a pinch of salt...but nevertheless:
https://thejudge13.com/2023/03/06/aston ... ap-breach/

Indeed this website has a very reliable source from with the team who has been a whistleblower on numerous occasions, the last such being the disaster the team faced this time last year with an poorly designed car that barely made winter testing.

The source describes a system put in place to negate the budget cap by having AMR employees paid by different companies outside the racing team.

“168 members of AMRF1 staff were moved over to a company called Formtech,” says the insider,

…they are all still in the same jobs wearing AMR uniform with all the job perks and bonuses but not on AMR F1 budget. They also all received a £5000 “bonus” which was paid at the end of October 2021, another £5000 will be paid at the end of October 2022 to anyone who has stayed on for the 12 months.”

As to how true the details are in this communication, nobody will ever know. But it would be unlikely to be a huge surprise to many within the paddock, and even the fan base, that this kind of loophole was being employed.

“Fast forward to 2022 more staff were moved again but this time to “Aston Martin GP Services Limited” again same job roles etc etc but without the £5000 “bonus”…” claims the disgruntled employee of Aston Martin,

“In total this is around 200 people doing the exact same jobs, wearing the AMR F1 green uniform, the only difference is the bank account they’re paid from…”

[chrisc90]

Does anyone have a list of known smaller/feeder companies to the main teams then?

[vorticism]

He's only enjoyed two years of being in the right place at the right time and they weren't dominant cars at all, in fact 2005/2006 were some of the closest constructor's championships in history. Fernando has never had a dominant car ever in his F1 career compared to Vettel Lewis and Max who've had years of them as only RedBull and Mercedes have won in F1 over the last 13 seasons.

Part of the tragedy of the 2009 regs changes (and the 2014 regs changes where they doubled down on the bad parts of 2009). That era really was ideal by many measures. Looked good, sounded great, compact, lightweight. Should have kept developing that formula. A 2006 formula with venturi tunnels would have been (they've already gone back to center loaded FWs in '22).

[karana]

It's worth mentioning that just because employees are not directly employed by the F1 teams, their salaries don't count towards the budget cap. Red Bull Racing Limited, the actual competitor behind the RB F1 team, has only around 50 employees. The rest works for Red Bull Technology Limited and their salaries do still count.

[JordanMugen]

Looked good

The minimum radius rule was very necessary. It worked well, just as it works well in the 2022-present regulations.

In the modern era, teams will put literally hundreds of winglet/strakes/fins anywhere there is a free legality box, hence why there almost no free areas in the 2022-on regulations at all. (Apart from small sections right next to the chassis sides and around the cockpit.)

If you had maintained the 2006-type rules to present, instead of just the bargeboards and under & over the nose having hundreds of vortex shedding edges, the whole car would have that all over it. All those single or single slotted winglets on the 2008 would almost certainly each turn into 5, 10, 20 or more elements as we saw with the bargeboards and other fins. The cost to manufacture the cars would be outrageous and frankly they would look ridiculous.

A 2006 formula with venturi tunnels would have been (they've already gone back to center loaded FWs in '22).

The only thing stopping front wings with 50 elements in 2006 was time, there was nothing in the rules stopping it...

McLaren, Ferrari, Williams and Toyota already had double layer front wings in 2008, as a precursor to the elaborate front wings of 2011 and onwards. McLaren's upper front wing had already gain a slot by the end of 2008 and you can expect it would probably have gained 20 slots by 2022...



I maintain that the minimum radius rule was a good idea, as it made the sidepods look much neater, as the sidepods still do to this day.



Obviously creating the Y250 vortex and making the rear wings narrow was a mistake, however.

[Just_a_fan]

Take it with a pinch of salt...but nevertheless:
https://thejudge13.com/2023/03/06/aston ... ap-breach/

Indeed this website has a very reliable source from with the team who has been a whistleblower on numerous occasions, the last such being the disaster the team faced this time last year with an poorly designed car that barely made winter testing.

The source describes a system put in place to negate the budget cap by having AMR employees paid by different companies outside the racing team.

“168 members of AMRF1 staff were moved over to a company called Formtech,” says the insider,

…they are all still in the same jobs wearing AMR uniform with all the job perks and bonuses but not on AMR F1 budget. They also all received a £5000 “bonus” which was paid at the end of October 2021, another £5000 will be paid at the end of October 2022 to anyone who has stayed on for the 12 months.”

As to how true the details are in this communication, nobody will ever know. But it would be unlikely to be a huge surprise to many within the paddock, and even the fan base, that this kind of loophole was being employed.

“Fast forward to 2022 more staff were moved again but this time to “Aston Martin GP Services Limited” again same job roles etc etc but without the £5000 “bonus”…” claims the disgruntled employee of Aston Martin,

“In total this is around 200 people doing the exact same jobs, wearing the AMR F1 green uniform, the only difference is the bank account they’re paid from…”

It's the sort of thing Red Bull do - arms length the staff (no doubt for legally allowed tax purposes). Their published accounts claim they only have 52 staff (50 in racing, 2 in admin) compared to, say, Mercedes with 1004 staff (831 design, manufacturing and engineering; 173 admin). So where are all of the Red Bull people? Or does Newey really design, make and build the cars entirely on his own after all?

[JordanMugen]

It's the sort of thing Red Bull do - arms length the staff (no doubt for legally allowed tax purposes). Their published accounts claim they only have 52 staff (50 in racing, 2 in admin) compared to, say, Mercedes with 1004 staff (831 design, manufacturing and engineering; 173 admin). So where are all of the Red Bull people?

Red Bull Racing and Red Bull Technologies have always been separate companies, since at least 2006.

Red Bull Racing buys their stuff from Red Bull Technologies (at least on paper), just as HAAS F1 Team buys their design services from Ferrari SpA and their manufacturing services from Dallara.

It was part of the arrangement for how Red Bull Technologies could design the cars for both Red Bull Racing and Toro Rosso at the time when that was allowed in the rules, just as Honda Racing F1 did the same with Super Aguri using the same chassis as Honda (or a year old Honda chassis).