FIA president shows no sign of backing down over Andretti issue as he insists that there is no reason not to have as many as 12 teams.

At a time when the various interested parties insist that 10 teams is more than enough, fans of a certain vintage will recall those heady days of the late 80s and early 90s when as many as 40 drivers would turn up, necessitating the infamous early morning pre-qualifying sessions that would reduce the field to a far more manageable 30 entries ahead of qualifying.

Eurobrun, Coloni, Onyx, Zakspeed, Rial, AGS... race after race they turned up, piloted by the likes of Gregor Foitek, Pierre-Henri Raphanel, Volker Weidler, Enrico Bertaggia and Claudio Langes.

Though one can understand the need not to return to those days, the sport is clearly at odds over whether there is a need to expand the current grid from 20 to 22 or 24.

The likes of Mercedes and Ferrari talk of DNA and the worthiness of new entries, while reports suggest that in lieu of the sport's increasing popularity the teams are calling for the $200m 'dilution payment' to be increased to as much as $600m.

If nothing else, such a demand ends all talk of DNA and worthiness and reinforces the belief that this is simply about money.

We've established they're whores, now let's agree on the price.

Speaking on a visit to the Dakar rally-raid, Ben Sulayem doubled-down on his social media comment at the weekend, urging the need for more teams on the grid.

"In general, if we look at the sustainability of Formula 1, we have to open it up to other brands," he said.

"We can have up to twelve teams on the grid," he continued. "An OEM will help make Formula 1 better and I see no reason for which we should not welcome new teams, especially the Americans.

"We have three races there already this year. We welcome any proposal to be one of the twelve teams. We accept good teams, even if they are small, as is the case with Haas.

"We hope that things will change and we will be able to have a proper eleventh team, we'll see what happens."

According to Reuters, a "senior figure" in the sport insists that a "strong majority" of teams are against expanding the grid, even to eleven teams.

Ignoring the rumoured $600m dilution payment which would clearly ease their pain, one feels that some of those current teams may have forgotten what brought them into the sport in the first place... as opposed to what keeps them there now.

We know for an absolute fact that as recently as last year Gene Haas was still looking to sell his team, and if we are looking at 'worthiness' and the rest of it, romanticism aside, what exactly does Haas bring to the sport?

Indeed - and we find it almost impossible to believe we are writing this - what, in its current guise, does Williams, Britain's most successful team in terms of constructors' titles, bring to the table other than its historic name? And let's not forget, that it was the Grove outfit - currently without a team principal or technical director and owned by an American investment firm - that allowed Toto Wolff his foot in the F1 door, so to speak.

All this aside however, there is the increasing feeling that F1 and Ben Sulayem are at odds and possibly heading towards a confrontation, for, in the face of the reaction to his tweet at the weekend, the FIA president is clearly not for turning and is actually publicly doubling down on his claim.

The two have appeared at odds almost from the time he was elected, just six days after the infamous 2021 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.

A cynic might suggest that there is more to this than meets the eye.

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READERS COMMENTS

1. Posted by Chester, 25/01/2023 11:49

"Ben Sulayem vs. the insular, fear-of-new-entrants

Thank you, Ben Sulayem. Free market and open competition vs. the old insular cartel that has been F1 recently.

"

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2. Posted by kenji, 15/01/2023 6:58

"@ alvarezh3...All cool mon ami...likewise, but I already said and I busted soon after. No self control. ' maybe it's cos ise getting old'."

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3. Posted by alvarezh3, 15/01/2023 1:06

"@Kenji

Ha, ha, ha, I heard a rumor that the employees said: "We don't need no educator......pam param.....!"

Or our editor gets a laugh, or we are going to get blocked out!

I don't know about you, but i am going to satrt behaving! :-)"

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4. Posted by kenji, 15/01/2023 0:15

"@ alvarezh3....latest rumour is that Roger Waters has been recruited by Aston Martin as Tech Director with an amended contract condition requiring him to ensure that the team become 'Another Brick in the Wall' of F1 in '23."

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5. Posted by alvarezh3, 14/01/2023 18:44

"@Kenji

Agree with your choices!

Yes, we shan't keep this up, hopefully we can be forgiven for being off topic as we are off season and there is only one or two daily newsworthy stories to report.

Anyhow, we shouldn't abuse of our editor's kindness.

Back to F1! :-)"

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6. Posted by kenji, 14/01/2023 13:39

"Apologies to the forum for my non F1 comments....will change my wicked ways haha."

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7. Posted by kenji, 14/01/2023 13:37

"@ alvarezh3.....To me Beck was the last of the 80's shredders and his style is not universally liked yet he is universally admired for his originality and yes, you are correct re 'others'. Clapton still remains at the pinnacle especially his stand out rendering of the 'Edge of Darkness' theme at the Albert Hall. Just magic. Sends a shiver down the spine!!!, though all his blues are sublime. The same genre also features largely in my 'best of' with Algerian Rai and Greek Rembetika and of course added into that are the fascinating central African Malians like Ali Farke Toure. Blues with a twist...marvellous music. There are quite a few others that are almost there like Trucks/Vince Gill and Keb Mo to name just a few, they are all just wonderful players. "

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8. Posted by alvarezh3, 13/01/2023 18:56

"@ Kenji

Now that you mention Williams, that would not be bad a team for Hyundai to buy, specially since they -as you properly indicate- are not too well schooled in Formula 1. At least it would give them a good foundation to start their project.

I play guitar (not that good though) and I can attest to Beck's unique technique and the superb use of modulation, vibrato, bends, etc. His overdriven tone (hard to duplicate due to his personal finger touch) is not liked by everyone.

Tal is such a talent, apart to playing the bass, she's also a guitarist. Also great to watch her and Beck on the "Live at Ronnie Scott's" presentation.

I guess you like Clapton's style and more subtle tone as you once mentioned J.J. Cale which not many people have heard of (outside of the USA). As I would think you know, Clapton plays some of his creations."

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9. Posted by kenji, 13/01/2023 12:50

"@Alvarezh3....Teams and Management changes are all the go these days. Vowles has defected to Williams and that should be one to watch however as the '23 car is long finished we won't see any of his input until at least '24. Both Hyundai and Kia have taken giant strides over the past few years and a foray into F1 would be a giant step for them on a global basis. Their latest crop of new cars is extremely impressive.

The loss of Jeff Beck is tragic. Only 24 hrs ago I had a 3 hr session listening in to Beck and Wilkenfeld reprising their 'Crossroads' performances, amongst others. Whilst i was not a great fan of his 'fusion' style he will be remembered as a epic artist who could make his guitar speak like no other. My liking of Beck goes a bit deeper though. He was largely instrumental [ no pun intended ] in bringing to the world stage a guitar player of immense talent. He took Tal Winkenfeld, a teenage Sydney girl, and made her a part of his world. Her playing is superb and she became an integral part of his band for quite some time. Beck awarded her his solo take on that very number you have nominated. Check it out...sensational. He will be missed by so many...."

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10. Posted by alvarezh3, 12/01/2023 14:15

"@ Kenji

Saw that information a few days ago. Will be interesting to see what excuse the usual complaining F1 teams will come up with to protest Hyundai if they decide to join the series.

On a side note, we just lost Jeff Beck. 'Cause We've Ended as Lovers, one my favorite tracks......sad."

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11. Posted by kenji, 12/01/2023 12:36

"On the suject of new teams..there have been low level rumours floating around that Hyundai may well be interested and it would make sense for F1 to have another ASIAN player. This company has been quietly building on it's motorsport expertise and todays announcement that Cyril Abitaboul is joing them as TP for their WRC team leaves them open to tapping into Cyril's not inconsiderable expertise in F1."

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12. Posted by ancient70!, 12/01/2023 10:10

"question, how can you have a sport club, ie F1, where the more members you have, the poorer they are? And I mean good members, not just numbers. Then there is the other question of costs, now Toto Wolf claims that all the current teams spent a fortunes to get to the current position in the sport. Now err um excuse my ignorance, but I seem to recall that Merc and Renault absolutely insisted on the current v6 single turbo with all the electrical goodies tacked on, and the FIA added the hybrid requirements. I would love to know the total amount Merc spent on developing this lot. And yes they did a good job, and now all the others were spending fortunes to try and catch up. So big name car companies are good for F1? I have been following F1, in its various guises, since the early sixties, and to my recollection there were two cases were car companies contributed positively, ie Ford with the development of the dfv, and Renault for introducing the 1500cc turbo grenade engines! Generally the big names come in, ratchet cost up astronomically, and then the CFO gets the sniffles, and they disappear leaving a big mess behind.
And yes the current ICE has excellent thermal efficiency, but as Adrian Newey has pointed out, if you are lugging 150 kg of ballast around the lap, the overall energy efficiency of the car is pretty pathetic.
Ok, sorry about the rant, but I will now go look for some new toys to throw out of the pram! "

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13. Posted by kenji, 11/01/2023 23:05

"@ alvarezh3...very good. Make F1 Great Again."

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14. Posted by alvarezh3, 10/01/2023 14:12

"We the people want 12 teams.

We want 12 teams!

We want 12 teams!

We want 12 teams or we will storm FOM's headquarters! :-)"

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"We have to open up F1 to other brands," insists Ben Sulayem

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