F1 News
Tost: "We can't knock on Red Bull's door for more money"
- GPblog.com
The coronary pandemic has brought about many changes, including the postponement of the new regulations in Formula 1. The intention was to start driving new cars next year, but that has now been postponed to 2022. This will give the teams more time to develop the new cars, but the pandemic also brings financial challenges.
Very worried
With hardly any income because there is no racing, several teams are facing a difficult situation. After all, the costs keep on going and that results in a hole in the budget. In order to develop a new car, new costs are made and with a gap in the costs it is difficult. Especially for the smaller teams, including AlphaTauri.
To F1.com Franz Tost says: "I’m also very worried about next year. Although we can take over more or less this year’s car for 2021, because there is no regulation change, but in 2021, we have to design and fabricate a completely new car for 2022, and I still don’t know how we can manage this from the financial side."
"To build up such a big project costs a lot of money. But we will see. It has been decided this way, I would have preferred to postpone to 2023, but FOM and FIA have decided against that so now we have to get the best out of it."
Money from Red Bull
Although AlphaTauri is part of the Red Bull group, it is not the case that the team can knock on the door for an extra bag of money. "We have a business plan and of course we get a certain amount of money [from Red Bull], but we have to stay within these figures. It’s not a case of just asking for more money, we have to find ways not to overspend – like it is the case everywhere."
In conclusion, Tost says: "This is a big challenge to bring together this amount of money. If you don’t do so many races this year, we won’t get as much money next year from FOM. Anyway, this has been decided."