“We will support freezing”- Ferrari joins Red Bull in imposing the Engine freeze from 2022 until the new engine regulations are introduced.
Ferrari in a shock move has agreed to support Red Bull’s demand of engine freeze, as the latter feels it wouldn’t be able to deliver a power unit to its team when Honda leaves the sport unless there is no engine freeze.
This is a huge u-turn by Ferrari CEO Louis C. Camilleri said that it is against the spirit of F1. So far, only Mercedes was baking Red Bull’s demands, while Renault was clinging with Ferrari.
It was Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto who said on Friday that Ferrari would be agreeing with Red Bull for the engine free, and have also settled with the fact that the new regulations will jump one year earlier in 2025 instead of previously decided 2026.
“I think what we said is there are already regulations in place where somehow Red Bull has got a solution, they may be supplied by other manufacturers, that’s no doubt,” Binotto said when asked by Motorsport.com if Ferrari’s position had changed.
“We understand as well their intention to keep using their Honda engine for the future. We had meetings in the last days with F1 and the FIA. I think as Ferrari, we understand the situation.
“We are supportive in trying to anticipate by one season, one year, the freezing of the engines because that would mean as well trying to anticipate to 2025 the new regulations for the power units.
“Knowing the situation and understanding the situation, it’s not the first time that Ferrari is acting in a responsible way in that respect. So we will support freezing, by anticipating by one year the engines, the power unit.”
Easier for engine freeze in 2022
With Ferrari joining its two biggest rivals, it is certain that others will also fall in line, including Renault, who remains to be the only engine manufacturer still against the freeze, but still, this contingent will still make it easier to push FIA.
“Talks are ongoing moment with the FIA, with F1, if we should consider a mechanism of engine convergence, if there is any situation where eventually a manufacturer is really down on performance compared to the others,” Binotto said.
“Because then it’s freezing for three years the relative performance between manufacturers. I think those details will be important.”
Binotto said the incoming regulations brought forward by one year to 2025 would result in “quite a different power unit” to the one currently used, but that clarity on its technical make-up was required by the middle of 2021.
“To have a brand new format of the power unit in 2025, we will need by the middle of next year clarity on the regulations, I think it will be quite a different power unit to today, because I think there are, at least from the Ferrari point of view, important objectives that need to be set, as for example quite a different cost.
“It has to be more sustainable in terms of a cost point of view. I think the power unit should cost 50% of what we are affording today. In order to achieve that, I think in order to decide what will be the technical format, it is somehow very difficult exercise.
“I think as well from the sustainability, so carbon footprint point of view, we have to set our objective which has to be very ambitious.” he further said.
“We need to be very proactive but also collaborative between manufacturers, F1 and the FIA in order to progress very soon on the regulations. That will define the future of F1 from 2025 to 2030.”
