Sidepodcast

Anyone for a Breakaway?

The Formula One Teams' Association has announced that it is setting up a breakaway championship. Eight of the current Formula One teams met up at the Renault factory in Enstone and concluded that enough was enough, it's time to do things their own way.

A statement from FOTA read:

The teams cannot continue to compromise on the fundamental values of the sport and have declined to alter their original conditional entries to the 2010 World Championship. These teams therefore have no alternative other than to commence the preparation for a new Championship which reflects the values of its participants and partners.

Then they really twist the knife on the FIA President Max Mosley, with the rather excellent:

This series will have transparent governance, one set of regulations, encourage more entrants and listen to the wishes of the fans, including offering lower prices for spectators worldwide, partners and other important stakeholders.

Fighting talk indeed.

While there's nothing to say any of the above will come to fruition, is does mean that today's FIA imposed deadline is all but shot to pieces. Evidently current drivers and sponsors will migrate to the new series on mass, and importantly so will "promoters". Which begs the question where does Bernie stand in all of this?

Now the cat is really amongst the pigeons. Finally the sport has taken a significant step forward and suddenly we find ourselves interested in the politics of F1 again. As ever, feel free to discuss events in the comments.

Daily: 6th May 2009

The other half of Sidepodcast has now been taken out by whatever made me unwell last weekend, so the daily post once again falls on my watch. Luckily I am useful enough to be able to type, unfortunately covering the day's F1 news with brevity and panache isn't my thing, so the F1 Minute podcast is having a bit of a rest right now.

To keep everyone ticking over, here's a couple of thoughts to start the day:

• FOTA are meeting in London this morning to chat about the recent descisions Max threw up (almost literally) last week. Budget caps will no doubt be top of the agenda. The question is, will one day be enough time to figure out the best course of action?
• Most of the KERS enabled teams all appear to be pulling the device from their chassis prior to the Spanish GP. Circuit de Catalunya contains many sweeping curves and finding the correct balance is essential, but people must be questioning the validity of such R&D expenditure when the things aren't even doing a full season.
• The sidebar on the Sidepodcast homepage had a little refresh yesterday, it's now possible to listen to shows and adjust the volume at the same time. Revolutionary, I know. It is a stop-gap solution though, and hopefully a more feature rich and elegant alternative will be available soon.

The comments on the daily thread were excellent yesterday, do keep your thoughts coming and do yell if anything interesting is happening in your world during the next 24 (ish) hours.

Show Them How It's Done

With a grand press conference due to take place in Geneva tomorrow, there's plenty of speculation about what the Formula One Teams' Association will be announcing to the media. They say they want to discuss their plans for the future of F1, and from what we can tell, that vision may differ significantly from anything the powers-that-be have in mind.

Today's Weekly Grapevine on autosport.com (subscription required) makes mention of the association's desire to extract more money from Bernie and more power from Max. However, it seems unlikely anything is going to vastly change, at least not in the short term.

One thing that does need to change, and quickly, is the official FOTA logo. If you've read the aforementioned article you'll likely have spotted the following "mess" masquerading as a design:

It's not good. If anything is in need of a revamp, FOTA first need to look a little closer to home.

We can help them though. In the past the Sidepodcommunity has stepped up to the design plate and helped Jenson colour his helmet, offered Branson his very own Formula One logo, and solved many other artistic related challenges.

If you fancy having a go please add your contributions to the drop, and if we get enough submissions, maybe we'll hold a poll to select the best one. There's no prize at stake of course, nor will FOTA pay the blindest bit of notice, but if you're victorious, you'll know you can design better than the whole of the F1 paddock combined. Money can't buy that kind of kudos.