Ladies and Gentlemen,

The penultimate race of the year is next. Let’s get prepared for the Brasilian GP this coming weekend.

Politics are centre stage now that the Drivers’ and Manufacturers’ Championships are decided. And politics in F1 are as vicious as anywhere else, or worst. 

There’s no agreement no solution in sight for the engine supply problem. The FIA proposal to tender a ‘generic’ power plant at low cost was generally accepted by all but vetoed by Ferrari to the particular disgust of Jean Todt. Ferrari is looking after its own interest, same a Mercedes that next year will have better engines for the works team than those supplied for the customers teams, and the same for McLaren that has rejected Honda’s requets to provide their units for Red Bull next year.

The latest in the Red Bull saga is that they are close to an agreement with Renault for 2016 & 2017. Many of the current components of the Renault engines are developed and made by RBR Technologies, so what they want is Renault Sport to provide the basic motor with Red Bull utilizing their own combustion chamber design (by Mario Illmor who works for both Mercedes and Red Bull) and ERS system. With Red Bull now paying for their own engines they will be free to call the new motor anyway they want, most likely the name of a sponsor.

So it seems that we will not lose the four cars from the energy drink company next year to the relief of the entire GP community, particularly Bernie and his partners now that F1 is going down in public interest and declining audiences.

And here comes the interesting question: if Red Bull’s new Renault-developed engine becomes as good or better than the rest, do you think they will share it or supply it to others? We know the answer. Ferrari, Mercedes, McLaren, Red Bull, Renault or any of the big players are looking only after their own interests, nobody is looking after the interests of F1 as a whole, nobody wants a playing field, they are spending mountains of cash to gain an advantage and when they find it they will defend it and exploit it to the max. No wonder F1 is always in crisis.

Recently the head of the British GP has declared that “F1 is becoming a hard sell product”. Organizers are struggling to pay Bernie’s prices, if an icon like the British GP is in decline is no surprise that we don’t have a French or German GP and now we might lose the U.S. GP next year as they will not anymore have Government support- and the thousands of Mexicans regularly attending are now staying home for their race.

Yes, the bad news are piling up, the show is losing its appeal and Bernie and the owners of the circus refuse to change the business model.

So let’s forget politics for now. What we really want is about to start tomorrow at the Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace and for the next 3 days. FP1 begins at 11am local time. And the weather forecast is rain and more rain...

A quick note on CFA news: Joe was the winner of the Mexican GP with 13 points (4 triples), not Lorenzo as previously reported. A rare glitch in our system didn’t collect the info at closing time. My apologies.

Until tomorrow

Cheers

Cato