Budget cap causes problems: 'Only two or three major upgrades a year'

Since the 2021 season, there has been a budget cap for Formula 1 teams, and F1 teams and racing stables have to manage their money well. The budget cap was supposed to ensure that the cars would be closer together and make the field more competitive, but according to James Allison, it has not entirely succeeded.

In recent years, Formula 1 has made every effort to make the field sit closer together. With the new cars that were introduced in 2022, overtaking should become easier, which would mean more action on the track.

Despite that, Red Bull now leads the championship by a very large margin. The battle for the spots next to Max Verstappen on the podium is often more exciting, but a fight for the championship title is not in the cards for now.

Allison experiences problems with F1's budget cap

Talking to Motorsport.com, James Allison explained that the budget cap is not helping Red Bull catch up: "Back in the day, when cost cap wasn't there, then you could drop those things out the wind tunnel pretty much every other day, and people would furiously design them and then you'd furiously build them, which meant the lag between where the tunnel was and where the track was always only a few weeks." As a team, according to Allison, you can now only do two or three major upgrades a year, making it harder to make up for a poorer start to a season.