Mercedes boss Toto Wolff: F1 cost cap has helped 'protect us from ourselves'

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff recently expressed his thoughts on the F1 cost cap regulations. Before the 2021 F1 season, the FIA imposed a new cost cap rule that would disallow any team from spending more than a certain amount on research and development. Though the Silver Arrows will be most affected by the budget regulations, their team boss welcomes the change.

In an exclusive interview with The Times, Toto Wolff appreciated the cost cap rule implemented by the FIA under Chase Carey. He explained how front-running teams like Red Bull, Mercedes, and Ferrari were previously in a league of their own. Now, however, the top midfield teams have a great opportunity to pounce on frontrunners, and bag podiums and race wins as well. Wolff said:

"The key change was the cost cap introduced by Chase Carey [former executive chairman of F1] to protect us from ourselves."

He further added:

"The situation before was that Red Bull, Ferrari and Mercedes were fighting in their own league in a revolving spending war, but the smaller teams were not competitive. The cost cap was based on a blueprint that existed in the US for a long time. In the NFL and NBA, you have a limit to what you can spend on your roster. F1 introduced a cost cap on technical development, which was the game changer for the business side of F1. Suddenly, we were profitable."

He also gave examples of other US-based sports like the NFL and NBA that use the cost cap system to promote tighter competition. After applying the same rules to the racing series and drastically changing other technical regulations, the sport boomed as the races became much closer and more exciting.

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Christian Horner praised F1 cost cap rules after Red Bull breached it

Red Bull team boss Christian Horner also praised the FIA's cost-cap regulations. He believes that the cost cap has helped the team spend more prudently. In 2022, Red Bull will be heavily penalized for breaching the cost cap in the 2021 F1 season. Despite this, Horner has positive things to say about the rule.

Speaking to RacingNews365, he stated:

"It's helped to reduce costs, for sure, and it's had a direct hit on the bottom line with the amount of stock, the number of components that you make, and the amount that you can actually spend is obviously heavily restricted now compared to previous years. It's just driven efficiency throughout the business. In years gone by, there would be millions of pounds' worth of unused stock left at the end of the year, that would effectively have to be written off."

He further added:

"Now, you can't afford to do that, you can't afford to carry that, you have to be absolutely efficient and frugal with how you apply your budget, particularly in development and manufacturing."

Red Bull was fined $7 million, and their wind tunnel time was reduced by 10%. Since they are the reigning world champions as well, they will hardly have time to test their car in the wind tunnel compared to other teams.