WMSC meeting: medals system for drivers champ in 2009 / "soft" cap for 2010 teams!

[Team_Mclaren]

I dont know how i feel about these changes... "medals" sounds pretty fucking gay, of course only the winner gets a "medal".... the proposed point system of 12-9-7-5-4-3-2-1 was rejected.

http://www.itv-f1.com/News_Article.aspx?id=45278

Full decision from the WMSC:

A number of measures were agreed to help reduce costs and increase interest in the FIA Formula One World Championship.

2009 Formula One Regulations

Points

The WMSC accepted the proposal from Formula One Management to award the drivers’ championship to the driver who has won the most races during the season. If two or more drivers finish the season with the same number of wins, the title will be awarded to the driver with the most points, the allocation of points being based on the current 10, 8, 6 etc. system.

The rest of the standings, from second to last place, will be decided by the current points system. There is no provision to award medals for first, second or third place. The Constructors’ Championship is unaffected.

The WMSC rejected the alternative proposal from the Formula One Teams’ Association to change the points awarded to drivers finishing in first, second and third place to 12, 9 and 7 points respectively.

Testing

Teams will be allowed to carry out three one day young driver training tests between the end of the last event of the Championship and 31 December of the same year. Drivers are eligible only if they have not competed in more than two F1 World Championship Events in the preceding 24 months or tested a Formula One car on more than four days in the same 24 month period.

Teams can also conduct eight one day aerodynamic tests carried out on FIA approved straight line or constant radius sites between 1 January 2009 and the end of the last Event of the 2009 Championship.

Media

The FIA will publish the weights of all cars after qualifying at each Event.

For greater clarity for spectators and media, wet tyres have been renamed “intermediate” and extreme-weather tyres renamed “wet”.

On the first day of practice all drivers must be available for autograph signing in their designated team space in the pit lane.

All drivers eliminated in qualifying must make themselves available for media interviews immediately after the end of each session.

Any driver retiring before the end of the race must make himself available for media interviews after his return to the paddock.

All drivers who finish the race outside the top three must make themselves available immediately after the end of the race for media interviews.

During the race every team must make at least one senior spokesperson available for interviews by officially accredited TV crews.

A number of further amendments were adopted for the 2009 Technical Regulations. Full details will be available shortly on http://www.fia.com.

2010 Formula One Regulations

Budgets

As an alternative to running under the existing rules, which are to remain stable until 2012, all teams will have the option to compete with cars built and operated within a stringent cost cap.

The cost cap is £30m (currently approximately €33 or $42m). This figure will cover all expenditure of any kind. Anything subsidised or supplied free will be deemed to have cost its full commercial value and rigorous auditing procedures will apply.

To enable these cars to compete with those from teams which are not subject to cost constraints, the cost-capped cars will be allowed greater technical freedom.

The principal technical freedoms allowed are as follows:

1. A more aerodynamically efficient (but standard) under body.
2. Movable wings.
3. An engine which is not subject to a rev limit or a development freeze.

The FIA has the right to adjust elements of these freedoms to ensure that the cost-capped cars have neither an advantage nor a disadvantage when compared to cars running to the existing rules.

Click here for a Q&A document regarding the 2010 cost cap.

The Honda Racing F1 Team requested to change its name to the Brawn GP Formula One Team. The WMSC accepted this request on the basis that the team is, in effect, a new entry in the FIA Formula One World Championship. The contract the team had with the FIA was to run as ‘Honda’, which they are no longer in a position to do. However, the standard fee required for a new entry has been waived.

[urban.one]

13 out of 60 years is just about over 20% of the time we'd have seen a different champ. Id like to see the stats for what would have happened in the past 20 seasons.

It will be interesting. A DNF will be no worse than a second place in terms of the WDC however it would have an effect on the contructors championship.
Will we see teams gamble with reliability in order to win races knowing a DNF wont hurt you as much? Team orders and who a team's #1 driver is could also be affected.

This season could be wacky. With all the off season happenings and now this change, we could either see a boring season with a clear cut champion early in the second half of the season or we could see logjam of drivers with 2 or 3 wins each going late into the season.

Overall, the title winner would have been different on 13 occasions if the new proposal had been in place since the first championship in 1950.

[DJ Lazy]

So now it has nothing to do with a consistent F1 driver who is able to place in the top 3, but which driver is lucky enough to Win more races.

I think its bullshit, you win 6-7 (seemed like the avg last year) races but finish outside the top 10 or DNF even and you can still be world champion?? That's not really the sign of a great driver if you ask me.

[buh_buh]

Ferrari's just pissed they didn't win last season. This medal system minus the medals is bs. They should reward consistency, reliability and wins instead of just wins.

[Mibz]

Yeah, the win thing is open to bullshit, but until it actually happens I've got nothing to complain about. Honestly, as happy as I was that Hamilton won last year, I'd be hard pressed to deny that Massa deserved it too. I think we're all whining now but come the end of the season we'll see that the deserving driver ends up with the championship anyway. If not, then I'll be yelling the loudest :P

The alternate budget is a nifty idea but I think it's gonna take a guinea pig before anybody big jumps on board. With clauses like "If the FIA doesn't like it, there's a new rule about it" and "If you spend money on something and we change the rules to disallow it, you're SOL" I don't see competitive teams taking a chance. Also the fact that budgets have already been halved for next year mean the teams will probably think that they've already saved enough money. If we get a new team next season I certainly hope they give it a try.

Love the media enhancements. Though I feel bad for the drivers who -have- to be available right after they publicly humiliate themselves, it's nice for the fans.

As of now I'm indifferent about the changes, we'll see how they pan out during the season.

[DJ Lazy]

Originally posted by buh_buh
Ferrari's just pissed they didn't win last season. This medal system minus the medals is bs. They should reward consistency, reliability and wins instead of just wins.

Exactly... I see nothing wrong with the current points system.. It rewards all 3 of those. The 12-9-7 points system, I think is better than the current system, but that means nothing now.

Why change the drivers championship to this new system and leave the constructors on the old system?? Probably because Ferrari need all the points they can get..

They should have let the fans vote to decide which system to use.