Topics related to the budget cap have been of great interest within the F1 community lately. Red Bull was found breaching it earlier this year and was consequently fined a sum of $7 million for the same. They were also given a 10% reduction in wind tunnel time for the development of their 2023 car, and this shows that the FIA will take matters related to cost cap breaches very seriously.
The introduction of this budget cap was not a popular decision among teams in the first place. The bigger teams in particular maintained their gap to the rest of the field because of the vast amount of resources at their disposal. Now that every single team has to keep their spending below a fixed amount, the gap between them is bound to close at some point.
On top of that, many teams complained about external factors and called for the budget cap to be increased. The problem was that the cap shrunk after the 2021 season in spite of regulation changes and the addition of Sprint Weekends.
Most teams were still under the impression that the cap would shrink further next year. However, AMuS reports that the cap will actually increase next season.
Number of races and Sprint weekends contribute to increasing in F1 budget cap
The 2023 F1 season will feature the most number of races in a single year in history. With 24 races, it’s set to be the biggest F1 season of all time. China and Qatar will make a return to the calendar whereas Las Vegas will be a new entry.
On top of that, the 2023 season will have six sprint races. The concept of a sprint weekend was introduced in 2021 and continued this year too. However, we only saw three races being held in each season up until now. The sprint weekends add to more spending for the teams and also increase the risk of damages.
This is why the F1 budget cap will reportedly increase by $9.45 million next year. They will be able to spend $154.7 million in the 2023 season!
F1 teams gearing up for 3rd Sprint race of 2022 season
This weekend, teams and drivers will travel to Interlagos for the 2022 Sao Paolo GP. It’s one of the most iconic tracks on the calendar, and will host the third sprint and penultimate race of the 2022 F1 season.
However, both Championship Titles are already secured, and they are both heading back to Milton-Keynes with Max Verstappen and Red Bull after the Abu Dhabi GP.
