Teams are currently in talks with the FIA and F1 about increasing the budget cap due to the pressures of inflation and rising freight costs resulting from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February.
Ferrari F1 boss Mattia Binotto admitted on Saturday in Monaco his team would exceed the budget cap this year, while Red Bull’s Christian Horner felt clarity was needed about what penalties would result in going over the $140 million limit for the season.
But not all teams are in favour of increasing the budget cap. Alfa Romeo team boss Vasseur gave a dim view of his counterparts’ complaints in Saturday’s FIA press conference in Monaco, suggesting it was down to them to limit their development spend to stay under the figure.
“The difference is that we are not speaking about budget cap, we are speaking about budget on our side,” Vasseur said.
“I won’t be able to overspend what I have, and if we have some increase, and I can understand their situation.
“But if we have some increase on energy or freight, the solution is to switch off the wind tunnel and stop bringing updates every single weekend.
“We are in the situation where sooner or later we have to stop the development of the car, because we will be at the limit of our budget, and I think everybody can do the same.”
Otmar Szafnauer, Team Principal, Alpine F1 in paddock
Photo by: Carl Bingham / Motorsport Images
Vasseur’s view was shared by Alpine team principal Otmar Szafnauer, who said the impact of inflation was accounted for in forecasts for this year and the subsequent impact on development.
“Most teams do their budgets in November,-December time frame, for the following year, and we are no different,” Vasseur said.
“At that time, inflation was already at seven-plus percent, RPI in England was already 7.1%. We took that into consideration when we did our budgets and laid out all of the development work we were going to do.
“We’re still within it, even though freight was a…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at Motorsport.com – Formula 1 – Stories…