Saturday, October 21: Liberty Media will reveal the content of the new engine regulations for 2021

We will soon know a bit more about the future of Formula 1 by 2021. Indeed, according to the often well-informed German media “Auto Motor und Sport,” the Formula 1 owners plan to outline the upcoming engine regulations on October 21.

New engine manufacturers? Less expensive engines?

The content of this regulation will reveal the names of the engine manufacturers that will participate in the championship starting in 2021. New manufacturers such as Porsche and Cosworth have expressed interest in joining the discipline if the rules suit them. It is known that both entities have attended working group meetings on power units.

The regulations that came into effect in 2014 led to an explosion in engine development costs and an increase in the complexity of these turbo hybrid power units, accompanied by energy recovery systems.

Among the plausible hypotheses, without any leaked information, it is not presumptuous to think that the favored project is to standardize a part of the engine components, eliminate the kinetic energy recovery system in a straight line (MGU-K), and add a second turbo. Another concern remains the sound emitted by Formula 1 cars. With recurring criticism of the current engines noting the lack of noise from the single-seaters, it seems that the idea of adding a microphone at the exhaust level is one of the suggested solutions.

Towards a capping of budgets?

Auto Motor und Sport goes further by stating that Liberty Media will announce on November 7th the first budget cap proposal. A highly anticipated draft by private teams in the premier discipline.

On this point, there is a strong disparity of opinion depending on the teams involved. From the manufacturers’ side, a budget cap allocated to Formula 1 is seen unfavorably as it would restrict their room for maneuver. On the other hand, for private teams such as Force India and Sauber, it is a necessity to avoid a too large disparity in performance, constrained by the budget gap and an uneven distribution of commercial revenues.

It also seems that the Formula 1 owners wish to abolish the much-criticized strategy group since its inception. The idea would be to rely solely on the F1 commission to make essential decisions. However, currently, it is mandatory to go through the strategy group, made up of the top five teams, FIA members, and representatives of the owners, to initiate any decision-making phase.

Why such a decision? The idea behind this would be to reduce the involvement of the FIA and the teams in the decision-making process, in order to give more power to the commercial rights holders: Liberty Media. The teams are not necessarily opposed to this redistribution of roles if it allows for faster decision-making on essential sports regulations.

Finally, the year 2021 is likely to see changes in the field of commercial revenue redistribution since the Concorde agreements that determine the distribution will end in 2020.

Currently, commercial revenues are shared based on the Constructors’ Championship standings. Additionally, there are various fixed bonuses related to seniority. The distribution of revenues is not solely tied to on-track results. For example, teams like Ferrari or McLaren are guaranteed higher commercial revenues regardless of their results. Ultimately, this reduces the revenues available for redistribution to other teams. This task is therefore proving to be very delicate, as it involves finding a balance between rewarding loyalty and performance.