Red Bull handed $7m fine, aero testing reduction for cost cap breach

The FIA revealed after the Japanese Grand Prix that both Red Bull and Aston Martin were in breach of F1’s financial regulations for 2021, putting them at risk of sanctions.

Red Bull was deemed to have exceeded the $145 million cost cap, committing a minor breach that was less than 5% over the limit.

Red Bull fiercely denied it had broken the budget cap, but entered talks with the FIA over an Accepted Breach Agreement to reach a settlement.

The FIA’s cost cap administration discuss terms with Red Bull through last week before an agreement was struck on Wednesday, while team principal Christian Horner independently met with FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem in Austin to discuss the matter.

The agreement sees Red Bull admit that it broke the financial regulations, with the FIA handing the team a $7m fine that must be paid within the next 30 days.

The team will also lose 10% of its aerodynamic testing time from the announcement of the Accepted Breach Agreement.

The FIA said there was “no accusation or evidence” that Red Bull had “sought at any time to act in bad faith, dishonestly or in a fraudulent manner, nor has it wilfully concealed any information from the Cost Cap Administration.”

News of Red Bull’s breach earlier this month led to calls from its rivals for a strict sanction to be enforced, with McLaren boss Zak Brown saying that a possible breach by any team “constitutes cheating” in a letter written to Ben Sulayem and F1 boss Stefano Domenicali ahead of the United States Grand Prix.

The FIA’s findings into Red Bull’s cost cap breach found that while its 2021 submission was below the cost cap, it committed a procedural breach as it “inaccurately excluded and/or adjusted costs amounting to a total of £5,607,000.”

This meant the final budget total for Red Bull’s submission for last year was £118,036,000, meaning it exceeded the budget cap by £1,864,000 – or 1.6%.

Red Bull explained through talks with the FIA that the additional £5.6m was down to excluded costs that covered 13 areas. These included social security contributions for staff, apprenticeship levies, cost of use of the power units, and a clerical error in the calculation of costs re-charged to Red Bull by Red Bull Powertrains, among others.

The FIA also stated that had Red Bull applied the correct treatment…