09/10/2002
NEWS STORY
In a week in which F1 is held up to worldwide ridicule, following the announcement that the powers-that-be are considering punishing success, FIA President Max Mosley has gone one step further as the sport becomes the laughing stock of the world.
Speaking in Bahrain yesterday, where he was laying the foundation stone for the proposed Grand Prix track, Mosley admitted that one of the proposals being put to teams in an effort to improve the spectacle of the sport is to have drivers constantly changing teams.
"There is a large number of very radical proposals that have been circulated to the teams for discussion," he told the Daily Telegraph, referring to the document that was sent to all the F1 teams on Monday. "Some of these are very speculative ideas and we have to talk to the teams about them, but we mustn't sit there and not talk about things."
"There is an argument for each driver driving each car once," Mosley added. "This has an advantage because then we would see who are the best drivers and teams and if there are means to make it more interesting for the public then we have to talk about them."
This and other proposals will be discussed at the Formula One Commission meeting on October 28, though the subject is certain to be the main topic of conversation in Japan this week.
As for getting drivers to change teams, using Patrick Head's football analogy this would be like Manchester United being forced to use players from Crewe Alexander.
When the President of the sport's governing body is making suggestions such as this, then the lunatics truly have taken over the asylum.