3 replies to this topic

[SCHUEYFAN]

FOTA has presented the most serious threat to the FIA/CVC/FOM axis in recent memory and I'm sure Max and Bernie have been looking for ways to undermine them. Enter the diffuser fiasco, which after reading reports from various engineers is against the spirit of the new rules that are supposed to encourage more overtaking. I've also read a quote from Adrian Newey that he had a similar design to the current one used by Williams/Toyota/Brawn but was ruled illegal and they abandoned it. One must wonder if the FIA smelled a golden opportunity when this gray area arose early on, to create a ton of confusion and to shake up the current establishment as well. What better way to divide and conquer the teams than to create dissent from within and hope they self destruct. The FIA knew the ramifications of what was going to happen and now its unfolding. So now the remaining seven teams must spend a lot of money to try and catch up, despite all their efforts to try and keep the budgets down.

On the surface FOTA is saying the diffuser issue won't break their unity, but I don't buy it all. There must be a lot of anger amongst the principals and you can begin to see it boiling over, just look at Flavio's recent coments. Time will tell if they can put this aside and carry on or splinter apart. We will never know of course what went on, but this may very well be a master stroke of Mad Max to break the teams apart. Your thoughts?

[travbrad]

I'm inclined to say "yes" to any "did the FIA set up..." question, but it's always very hard to say.

No one actually knows the details of what was said, or what Red Bulls diffuser actually looked like. It may well have actually been illegal. Every diffuser is different, and I don't consider the FIA or an F1 team the most reliable sources for accurate information.

It could have even been an unintentional inconsistency too. After all, they have quite a track record of inconsistency.

[VresiBerba]

Although I'm no conspiracy theorist, it pains me to say yes. Given that Max said before the season started that he could have taken the issue to the ICA - before the season started - but didn't due to some inexplicable reason, it wouldn't surprise me if the whole thing was indeed a set-up to break the FOTA unity. But then again, Briatore is acting like a fucing idiot at the moment, and he does the FOTA no favours with his loose-cannon comments.

[AyePirate]

No I don't think they set it up, but they might be trying to capitalize on their f-up.
The FIA are incompetent and corrupt.

The incompetence: Frankly I don't think Max's Mos Eisley cantina crew have the needed engineering expertise to interpret their own rulebook.

The reason I don't think it's a set up is that not one but three design teams saw the loophole and a fourth came up with an even more clever solution (Newey's pull rod design) to increase rear end downforce. Personally I think it should be legal because to me that's the point-
the best problem solvers should win not necessarily the team with the largest budget (though one would never mistake Toyota for a budget team). There is no "spirit" of the rules. That's just something that governing bodies use to make up rules as they go along.

The corruption:
The length of time it took to make a ruling was corrupt. Making teams either wait to build new diffusers or go ahead and build new diffusers at the risk of spending millions (that teams may not have) on something that never gets use.
The situation presented Max a way of punishing Ferrari for joining FOTA sooner rather than later.
We likely would have gotten a different ruling if McLaren was in the "diffuser gang".

As for Flavio, he is a ******** who bleats like a stuck pig whenever someone else is faster or smarter. That's what he does.
Ignore him and listen to Pat Symonds in regards to Renault.


Red Bull are going to be hard to beat if they get a DDD working. They're already fairly fast without one.