17/11/2016
NEWS STORY
Just two months after Liberty Media began the process of buying the sport, F1 chairman Chase Carey has attended his first meeting of the controversial Strategy Group.
While colleague, Greg Maffei, Liberty's chief executive, was speaking at the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media and Telecoms conference in Barcelona, revealing the plan for more races... and thereby more money, Carey joined Bernie Ecclestone and Jean Todt at the Strategy Group meeting in Geneva.
While no final decisions came out of the meeting, among the issues being discussed were the clarity and consistency of the rules, particularly in the wake of events in Mexico.
Though Bernie Ecclestone has called for Charlie Whiting to start afresh with the rule book, it was suggested that the F1 Race Director and Safety Delegate holds too much power and that it is not only the rules that require overhauling but the whole procedure by which transgressions of the rules are investigated and penalised.
At the same time, one team put forward the idea of at least one permanent race steward.
Also up for discussion were track limits, while Mexico's Turn 1 was also discussed following the controversy surrounding the incidents involving a number of drivers including Lewis Hamilton.
Ecclestone's continued criticism of the noise - or lack of it - from the new era engines found little support, a call for further improvements rejected on the grounds of cost.
Though teams continue to test the Halo device, it was decided that there still needs to be more feedback from the drivers and teams before the sport can think of introducing it.
There was little interest in Force India's suggestion to move away from wind tunnel time to CFD, or Manor's proposal for more tunnel time for those teams using the cheaper 50% scale tunnels as opposed to the more expensive 60% versions.