Szafnauer: Scrapping planned rule changes would save millions!

Racing Point boss Otmar Szafnauer has suggested a further postponement of planned changes to F1’s technical rules and regulations as a way that the sport can make some much needed financial savings.

The sport was due to introduce a radical overhaul to car designs for 2021, but the disruption caused by coronavirus has already seen that pushed back by at least a year.

Now Szafnauer says that the sport should look again at the reforms with a view to delaying them even further – or possibly scrapping them altogether, if it looks like they’re not going to improve on-track competition.

Szafnauer convinced F1 could have ‘raced safely’ in Melbourne

“If we show that we have very good racing with the cars we have now, it would be prudent to look at either delaying [the new rules] by another year, or looking at the whole concept again and saying what we have now isn’t that bad,” he told the official Formula 1 website this week.

“If you don’t change the regulations, you end up saving money. In this day and age, we should be doing everything we can to try and spend less,” he added, speaking on a video conference call from his home in Oxford.

The initial delay in introducing the rules reforms is already playing to Racing Point’s advantage. They gambled on a radical overhaul of their own car design for 2020 with a close copy of last year’s Mercedes.

Originally that would have been just for one season before the new technical specifications came into effect, but that window of opportunity has already expanded.

“We knew when we made the decision that it would only be for one year, but now it looks like we will have a year and a half,” he commented. “Hopefully we can extend that even further.”

Szafnauer went on to explain why Racing Point had made the risky decision to follow Mercedes’ basic car design philosophy for its own RP20 in the first place.

“We have been looking at that concept for a long time, mainly because we are constrained with the gearbox that we buy from Mercedes,” he said.

“Mercedes have developed their gearbox casing to go along with that concept,” Szafnauer continued. “We would buy that casing from them and use a totally different aero concept, which meant we are always compromised.

“So for a long time, we wanted to move to the Mercedes-type aerodynamic concept – not having a high rake, a lower rear end – but we just never had the financial resources to do it. We always had to carry things over.”

The latest switch was made possible by new investment, after the struggling Force India squad was bought in 2018 by the Racing Point consortium set up by Lawrence Stroll, which has given the team a much stronger financial footing.

And while the lack of any racing so far in 2020 is definitely hitting income, Szafnauer points out his team is also finding ways of saving money during the coronavirus lockdown.

“[Coronavirus] has had a massive impact. We have put the business on hold,” he said. “We are currently on shutdown, so there is no development that has happened.

“Not much money has been spent, almost zero, which is also good. We have extended the shutdown, so there’s another two weeks, and I anticipate that will be extended again. It’s basically mothballing everything.”

“Morale hasn’t taken a hit at all,” Szafnauer replied when asked about the impact of having to put some of the staff on a government-backed furlough scheme. “We’ve had great feedback and the morale is strong.

“Everyone is very supportive. I think people understand the furlough, we have explained it well,” he said. “If you can explain the uncertainty away and it becomes certain and understood, the anxiety goes away and morale stays high.

“Like anything, if there is a bit of doubt and you can’t predict the future, or if there is uncertainty, then there is some anxiety.

“We need to learn that these types of things can happen,” he added. “We should put practices in place – maybe a more prudent cost cap, so that if it does happen again we’re on a better financial footing.”