'Campos & USF1 could miss opening three events'

[Guest]

Caps lock is activated.

[Dare]

I wonder how much Stefan is paying Bernie under the table?He
sure is pushing for them to receive a grid spot




Monday 8th February 2010
 
Bernie Ecclestone reckons Campos Meta and USF1 could miss the opening three races of this year's Championship, only joining the F1 grid in time for the Chinese GP.


Campos and USF1 are two of the four newcomers to Formula One this season but unlike the other two, their preparations have not been making headlines. Rather, reports of them have been about their financial woes coupled with Ecclestone's belief that they may not even compete this season.


And although Campos's team boss is confident he will have a solution to his team's financial troubles some time on Monday, Ecclestone still reckons both Campos and USF1 may sit out the first three rounds of the Championship in order to give them more time to secure funding.


The F1 supremo told the Express newspaper: "I think we won't see Campos and I don't think we will see the Americans."


And should either team miss the opening stint of the Championship, Ecclestone revealed they won't face a financial penalty as his terms allow all teams to miss up to three races.


Ecclestone also took the time to once again give his support to Stefan GP. Although the team does not have a place on the 2010 they are preparing in the hope that one of the newcomers will pull out before the season starts.


"They have got the money from the Serbian government, I've spoken to the prime minister," he said.

[John S]

I've never heard of this miss 3 races before, has anyone? Come to think of it Bernie has never mentioned it before, all he has banged on about is the fact some teams would not make it to the grid this season.

Why has he been shouting about USF1 and Campos when he knew all along they could legitimately miss the first 3 races?  

[Jericoke]

I think Bernie's stuck on the point of pride.  He arranged Concorde, and if someone isn't going to live up to it, it looks like he made a bad deal.

It also makes F1 look bad, to have less teams than advertised.  We might not all agree with Bernie about what is best for F1, but from a purely business point of view, it's hard to get new partners to sign on when your 'old new' partners don't even bother fulfilling their commitments.

If USF1 and Campos don't have to live up to Concorde, then why would Ferrari and McLaren?

[cosworth151]

USF1 has said over and over again that there is no basis to this rumor. My guess would be that a fair knock of that Serbian government money is going straight into Bernie's account.

[Alianora La Canta]

It sounds like 3 races only came in with the new Concorde Agreement of mid-2009. It should also be mentioned that any team missing a race loses one-eighteenth (or whatever the relevant fraction is for that year) of their TV money, so a team wouldn't want to miss a race unless it had very good reason to do so.

[pvbpoet]

Looks to me that there is Argentine money coming along w/ Lopez for USF1. Maybe the "Poison Dwarf" (Bernie) was speaking out of school.

[aazz]

I wonder if any of the the teams don't make any of the races if Bernie gives back some of the licence fee to the race promoters/organisers?

[Alianora La Canta]

I believe that only happens if the total number of cars drops below 20. Then Bernie can use the amount he saved from not needing to pay out the relevant portions of TV money to the teams that skipped to compensate the circuit owners.

[raindancer]

I am hoping they wont miss three races. 

[cosworth151]

USF1 team principal Ken Anderson has asked the FIA to allow his team to miss the first four races.

http://www.sportinglife.com/formula1/news/story_get.cgi?STORY_NAME=formula1/10/02/20/AUTO_US_F1.html

[Alianora La Canta]

Had it been three races and USF1 had accepted missing out on 3/19ths of its money for the year, the FIA might have said "yes". There is no interpretation of the Concorde Agreement that allows four, so I think the FIA will refuse.

Charlotte, we have a problem...

[judy]

It is ridiculous for USF1 to request FIA ro allow the team to miss 3 races and now they are requesting for 4 races. Thet have signed the agreement and furthermore they were among the first batch of new teams approved by FIA for the 2010 season.

[cosworth151]

They find themselves in the same situation that Super Aguri was in a few years ago. A sponsor defaulted on promised payments. It's something that is beyond the control of the team.

[Alianora La Canta]

Even so, USF1 could have helped itself by getting other sponsors on board - which in turn could have been helped by it not doing a 6-month radio silence immediately after promising a media storm.

[judy]

I agree with Alianora that USF1 has to get other sponsors fast to prevent the team from being affected by the situation of defaulted payment.

Even Super Aguri found some sponsors as replacement, but then Honda decided to withdrew their support in the end.