James Allison has revealed that talks with the FIA are underway to limit the amount of races that team personnel can attend.

This comes as teams prepare for the 2024 season, which, with 24 races, is the busiest in the sport's history.

This year's schedule of 22 races certainly affected the teams, especially the final triple-header and the subsequent back-to-back races in Las Vegas and Abu Dhabi, and some are already warning that next year's schedule is not sustainable.

"Everybody up and down the paddock... I've got so many mechanics who are ill, people in the engineers' office," said Mercedes driver and GPDA director, George Russell recently.

"They have really struggled with the constant timezone shifts, the body not knowing where you are, eating at different times, staying in different hotels, different environments, different climates," he added. "The body's getting confused.

"I think there are talks for next year about personnel being regulated, that they can't do every single race. I think that would be a good thing. I don't think it's sustainable for 4,000 people, I think it is, to do 24 races a season, especially when you see how geographically it still doesn't make a huge amount of sense."

No surprise that the schedule is yet another aspect of the sport on which F1 and FIA president, Mohammed ben Sulayem do not agree.

"It's the number that is required within the market," insists F1 CEO, Stefano Domenicali. "I would say it's the right balance between that, the complexity of the logistics and of the people that are working.

"I would say this is the number which we should target to be stable for a long time."

Meanwhile, the FIA president warns that 24 races will "cause a lot of fatigue".

Mercedes technical director, James Allison has confirmed that talks are ongoing whereby team personnel would be limited to just 20 races a season, a move that would involve all staff, even team bosses, but not the drivers.

"When you consider there is also winter testing to be done, if you're one of the travelling folk, then that is more than half the year spent on the road, and in a mode of working that is quite tiring, and quite demanding," he tells the Performance People podcast.

"All the people back in the factory who give live support to that as well are having to take that burden on their shoulders," adds the Briton. "So the sport has just started to address it because the cost cap means you can't reasonably contemplate saying, 'Well, it's now a sufficiently large number of races that we need to double up on the roles that do the travelling to allow them to alternate races or anything like that'.

"The financial reality of that makes that prohibitive inside the cost cap, so to try to impose some relief on an otherwise very difficult-to-manage season, the sport has just started to debate internally about whether we should have rules.

"Let's say in a 24-race season, it would mean that no individual, other than the drivers, would be allowed to do all 24 races, a cap would be imposed, maybe at 20 races, let's say, just plucking a number from the air.

"It would mean that everyone previously going to have to do the full slog would only be able to do 20 of them, and the teams would have to find it in themselves to put alternative methods of coping with the absence of each member of that travelling community four times per year. That will be an interesting set of gymnastics to cope with."

Allison is confident that no team would be at a disadvantage and that the ten teams "would all face that hurdle together", while believing that "the ones that wiggle their way through it effectively could turn it into an advantage by organisationally managing that in a slick way.

"The net positive would be that at least for a small number of weekends per year, you could rest and recharge if you were otherwise committed to a travelling role," he says.

"That will mean people like Toto, as team principal, would have to respect it as well. The race engineers, the ones who have the closest relationship with the drivers, Bono and Shov, a relationship that lots of people know about because they hear it on the radio, the drivers would have to hear a different voice four times a year.

"We'd have to figure out how to manage that in a good way."

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READERS COMMENTS

1. Posted by kenji, 14/12/2023 1:53

"When discussing the operations of private companies I always revert to age old dispute resolution, one can always withdraw their labour, a universal right. F1 is a unique employer given the modus operandi that currently exists. As such it calls for a unique approach and I believe that the individual teams are best suited to mold their operations around their particular needs and wants. At the same time they need to be working with their employees for a best outcome otherwise results may suffer. Commonsense really. FIA should not be involved."

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2. Posted by Superbird70, 13/12/2023 12:46

"@kenji, sorry for being obtuse. Surgeon is analogous to the driver. The patient would be the circuit. The Nurses, support staff, anesthetist would be the pit crew, caterers, and engineers. A scalpel could be a bolt though if you want.

Leaving private firms to determine what is best for their workers is usually not a good strategy for worker health and safety. It took major steps to get F1 as safe as it is for the drivers, and marshals. Often there were major incidents that triggered a review and then corrective action. Think Cevert, Bianchi, Massa's near miss and the marshal in Australia. Everything was fine until it wasn't."

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3. Posted by kenji, 13/12/2023 1:04

"@Suoerbird70....you are very close to the mark! The ship I referred to was the USS Talamanca built in 1931 and after the war was renamed TE Sulaco...a Turbine Electric ship. She certainly looked like an 11000 ton schooner with an almost straight bow stem and a counter stern!! I sailed as 4th Eng. and 2nd. refrig. eng. We were a banana boat based in New Orleans and central America. Your F1 analogy doesn't quite compute though as there is a world of difference between a brain surgeon and a 'bolt'. My take is simply that it is up to the teams to decide whether or not their personnel can perform their duties to their very best over a period of time. The FIA should butt out...IMO."

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4. Posted by Superbird70, 12/12/2023 14:38

"@kenji, Not to dismiss your time aboard the three masted schooner, but the issue isn't the length of time spent working. It is the conditions under which one has to work. An analagous situation to what is happening in F1 would be taking expert medical staff from one hospital, and moving them every week across multiple time zones to various countries, along with their equipment to perform delicate and unique surguries. Doing this some 20+ times a year and expecting no issues with performance or outcomes. Not likely."

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5. Posted by ARL, 12/12/2023 13:26

"Teams should only be allowed to take as many of their travelling people to any one race as fit lying down in the Tyrrell Woodshed."

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6. Posted by Superbird70, 12/12/2023 13:06

"@Max Noble, I would agree with you as long as each team had four drivers as well,with the race races split evenly."

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7. Posted by BrightonCorgi, 12/12/2023 12:44

"Forcing alternate drivers for 2-4 races a season will really shake up the Constructors and give new talent a chance to shine (or not)."

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8. Posted by kenji, 12/12/2023 7:58

"@Superbird 70. Just to clarify my posting point...the British MN Ships articles that I signed enabled the Company to keep me out/at sea for a maximum of 2 years. Articles could only be broken if the ship returned to it's home port after a minimum of six months. My second last voyage was with Turnbull Scott/Shell Oil Co. who never returned to our home port,Southampton, for eleven months. During that period I wouldn't have had anything more than a 24 hr break from the ships standard naval working regime. Tough life but a good one that provided many lessons in life!!!"

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9. Posted by kenji, 12/12/2023 7:32

"@Superbird70...Whilst the growth of heavy diesel motor ships has grown there are still very many 'steam' turbine ships plying the seven seas. Don't forget that all nuclear powered ships are also steam ships. Reactors only produce energy but steam turbines are still the main 'engines'. "

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10. Posted by Kkiirmki, 12/12/2023 6:28

"Maybe they should be more concerned with capping the number of "celebrities" who attend a race. "

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11. Posted by Max Noble, 12/12/2023 3:13

"Really simple rule… “No team member can attend any two races in a row.” Now go sort yourselves out. Increase the budget cap by a logical amount to allow for a few extra staff.
"

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12. Posted by Superbird70, 11/12/2023 23:39

"@kenji, there may work regulations to which the teams must adhere. Things have changed since the advent of steam."

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13. Posted by kenji, 11/12/2023 23:10

"Why should the FIA or anybody else get involved? Surely this is a 'demand pull' situation. If you are employed by the team for a season then you work for that season. No one is threatening anyone to work the required times as set out in the race schedule, with sacking, AFAIK. When I sailed in the British Merchant Navy we worked '4 on 8 off' for as long as deemed necessary under Ships Articles. Maybe we got a double watch in port sometimes but that would be unusual. yes, it's a long year but one of privilege IMO."

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14. Posted by elsiebc, 11/12/2023 16:39

"The simple solution: limit the number of races to 18."

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15. Posted by Superbird70, 11/12/2023 15:49

"Almost the entire pit-wall could work from home, since they spend most of the race looking at screens. The mechanics and pit-crew are the ones that are suffering, along with the drivers, and catering staff. The only way to make this work is to shorten the season or group the races by geographic location. "

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Talks to cap race attendance for team personnel

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