John Watson believes FIA choking innovation out of Formula 1 – Formula 1 news
Former Formula 1 driver John Watson believes that the new regulations set by FIA are forcing innovation out the sport.
Watson has had a career that is adorned with different teams and their cars, he also had the pleasure to drive the Brabham BT46 car that had the famous fan design. He says that the regulation changes that the FIA has gone with in order to cut the rising
costs in the aftermath to the economic downturn has been at the cost of losing out on innovation.
He says that coming up with new ideas to gain that extra bit of advantage over other teams is one of the fundamental aspects of the sport and makes it exciting. It is necessary to keep that excitement for the growth of the sport and to keep it true essence
alive.
“Everything is now macro-innovation; it's all very small increments, subtle changes. I think back to my generation from the early Seventies, the amount of innovation that occurred in that particular period was unbelievable compared to what we're seeing now,”
Watson said.
“The reason we have it of course is to keep a cap on costs, but in fact the macro-engineering and the macro-technology improvements are so much more expensive because it involves a huge amount of people, endless hours in wind tunnels, and at desks under
CAD/CAM or whatever,” he said.
Watson did however conceded that controlling costs is a need of the time and should be monitored but maintained that there needs to be a balance and the essence of the sport should not be lost in a bid to cost cutting.
Ferrari, Toro Rosso, Sauber, and Red Bull have quit FOTA over the issues relating to cost cutting and the restrictions put forth by FIA. It has been a subject of much debate, but no clear resolution has been in sight. Both FIA and the teams has been firm
on their positions. There needs to be a way out of the situation without the sport suffering but for that proper talks and mediation is required especially when the concord agreement is set to be revised in the near future.
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