FIA Decides For Diffusers – Brawn Wins Title
The thrill is gone. The FIA decided in favor of the loophole diffuser designs of Brawn, Williams and Toyota. In a suspiciously fast decision, the FIA decided the title for 2009.
Turn out the lights, the party is over! Despite all the claims regarding wanting the 2009 season to be an interesting one, the FIA has ruled the loophole diffusers are legal. The season is now over for all practical purposes. The Brawn GP team will win the constructors title. The only issue left is whether Jenson Button or Rubens Barichello will take the driver’s title. Rubens has always choked away his chances, so we can safely predict Jenson Button will take the title, making it two English champs in a row after the victory by Lewis Hamilton last year.
All credit to Brawn GP. Ross Brawn is quality and one need only look down the pit road to car in red to see how much he is missed. Who would have ever imagined the Honda team would be dominant in Formula One. Well, they are and it all comes down to the best manager in the sport – Ross Brawn.
The FIA, however, is an utter disgrace and has made a farce out of the F1 championship. The thing that riles the teams the most about the diffuser issue isn’t so much the loophole three teams found. The problem is other teams found the loophole, asked the FIA for clarification during the offseason and were told in no uncertain terms that they could not use the “double diffuser” that the FIA now says is legal. The teams were BMW and Renault. The only difference between these teams and Brawn, Williams and Toyota is that the latter three teams just did it. This lack of consistency is staggering.
The really odd thing about the FIA ruling is the speed of the decision. The appeals were heard during the afternoon and the FIA had a ruling the next morning. The diffuser issue is a highly technical one and actually involves three debates because the three offending teams have different diffuser designs. A decision that was expected to take at least a week, apparently took a working hour or two. Hmmmm….
So, what is all this really about? Clearly, this is an effort to break the Formula One Teams Association. Ecclestone and Mosley fear the power of teams united. Keeping them sniping at each other is a natural desire. Indeed, the Ferrari and Brawn teams got very personal in the appeal and it will be interesting to see how FOTA does after this. Remember, it is all about politics in F1.
Is there any point to watching the season? Well, the racing should be decent. You can expect Brawn to be dominant. The other teams will slowly catch up in pace as they develop their own diffusers. By the time they catch up, however, the point advantage of Brawn and Button will be extreme. I’ll be watching, but the thrill is definite over.
Lemmy