Sauber: “The proposal of a closed park after free practice on Friday is absurd”

Sauber has harshly rejected the idea of ​​reducing the time allowed to work on the repair and development of the cars, after the proposal made in recent races.

The German magazine Auto Motor und Sport had claimed that several parties had proposed a cost cut: in particular, a top team had raised the possibility that mechanics and engineers would be banned from working on the cars on Friday, the first day of free practice, outside of 180 minutes on track. The apparent logic of the proposal is that, just as no work is allowed in the "park fermé" period between qualifying and the race, the rule could be extended to Free Practice and reduce the size of teams of technicians and mechanics from 60 to 50 people . But Auto Motor und Sport says the small teams have bitterly rejected the idea, arguing that Friday is vitally important for them to test new parts: having no tests during the year and not having expensive simulation facilities, as they could develop the car?

At Sauber, team manager Beat Zehnder suggested that this reduction is not even necessary for the Swiss team. “We were in Hockenheim with 47 people, and we tested the car quite normally. I don't know why big teams need 60 people.", he commented through gritted teeth. Auto Motor und Sport also revealed that the idea of ​​identifying Ferrari, Red Bull, McLaren, Mercedes, Lotus and Williams as the exclusive suppliers of customer cars to the rest of the teams has now definitively faded. As some of the smaller teams have threatened to take the proposal to the European court, the new Concorde Agreement will continue to not allow the sale of the monocoque, suspension, nose and other key areas of the cars. For its part, the rumors that spoke of Volkswagen's possible entry into F1, precisely by taking over Sauber, are becoming less insistent: if the owner Peter Sauber had fueled the rumors in the Hockenheim paddock when he confirmed that he had met the president of the VW group Martin Winterkorn at the Geneva Motor Show, a source from the German automaker said: “As long as Ferndinand Piech is alive, VW's chance of a Formula One entry is zero point zero.”. Piech is the supervisory president of Volkswagen.

Lorena Bianchi