Ferrari "MotoGP" style customer team proposal dismissed by F1

Formula 1

Ferrari "MotoGP" style customer team proposal dismissed by F1

MotoGP has utilised customer teams to keep costs down

Sam Hall

Monday 27 July 2020 10:26

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Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto says the Scuderia put forward a "MotoGP" style proposal for the use of customer teams in Formula 1 only for the idea to be voted down by both the teams and the FIA.

While F1 regulations ensure each team designs at least the key elements of its car, MotoGP allow customer teams to purchase complete packages from the factory outfits.

Ducati, Yamaha, Honda and KTM all supply a customer team with up to date machinery, with Ducati also supplying a second with one-year-old hardware.

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Binotto admitted: "On what should be the future during the Covid period, during the discussions as Ferrari we brought at least as a proposal to consider customer… the big teams, as we’ve eventually got in MotoGP for example, but that proposal was pushed back by the entirety of, let me say, the teams and F1 and the FIA, which we fully understand."

Far from making the racing less exciting, this exaggerated number of competitive bikes has seen Yamaha customer team Petronas Yamaha SRT take victory in each of the first two races of the season.

However, Binotto accepts that a change on this scale would alter the DNA of F1.

He added: "I think that has been a decision we all took together. I think as Marcin [Budkowski - Renault executive director] said before, somehow, we decided that each single team should be independent, they should be capable of doing their own proper developments, I think they have the means now with the new Concorde Agreement and the regulations are sufficiently clear to do that.

"So yes, it will be great to have 10 teams, 10 different cars certainly on the grid."

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