Jean Todt sigue empeñado en hacer el deporte motor más ecológico (parece que vive en los chalets próximos a la curva de la Hípica del circuito del Jarama) y quiere ahora hacer carreras de coches sin ruido.
Si a Bernie y Montezemolo ya le rechinan los oidos el tener que pasar de 8 a 4 cilindros en 2013 no nos queremos ni imaginar su reacción ante la propuesta de Todt.
Según declaraciones del ex-mandamás de Ferrari y actual presidente de la FIA, la Federación impulsará un Campeonato del Mundo con silenciosos bólidos propulsados a baterías y sin rastros de motores de explosión y por ende de gasolina. En palabras textuales a Financial Times Todt dijo "queremos nuevas categorías basadas en este tipo de energía tan pronto como sea posible" al tiempo que deja caer que impulsarán toda aquella jugada que nos lleve a una competición más verde y ecológica (sin duda se compro algún chalet de los próximos a la curva 8 del Jarama, "lo haremos tanto como nos sea posible en todo el mundo."
A los carreristas les preocupa el sonido y las prestaciones, y Todt agregó que "es normal, todos quieren ganar, por eso lo que quieren es incrementar la potencia. Cuando hablas con los fabricantes se interesan [por estas mejoras], pero esto no es tan obvio en la competición porque no incrementa las prestaciones y es caro de desarrollar, pero comprendo esta postura."
Veremos ahora con que nos salen los "señoritos" de los chalets próximos de la curva 8 del Jarama cuando tengamos la pista llena de coches tipo Scalectrix!
A continuación la noticia del Financial Times
Motorsport chief on green mission
Jean Todt is determined to pursue his own agenda as president of the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile, motorsport’s governing body, which he has led since October 2009. But it may put him on a collision course with Bernie Ecclestone, the commercial supremo of Formula One.
Mr Todt, a former Ferrari team manager who masterminded the Scuderia’s seven F1 world championships between 1999 and 2007, has two main goals.
First, he is determined to drag the high-octane sport into a future of energy-efficient racing cars, requiring teams to embrace new technologies. Mr Todt and the European Commission share an understanding that the global reach of F1 is a tool to help increase public awareness of green energy, which is why the FIA is looking at creating F1-style electric car racing series. Mr Todt is also determined to use F1 drivers as ambassadors for his global campaign for road safety.
But getting F1 teams to adopt greener technology is a harder challenge, one he believes he is winning.
“I have been trying to convince them that we cannot be blind to the evolution of society around the world,” he said. “But it is true to say that it costs money.”
Mr Ecclestone says a move championed by Mr Todt to make teams use small-capacity turbocharged hybrid engines threatens F1 as a sporting spectacle, making racing cars so quiet that the thrill of the racetrack would be devoid of one key ingredient – noise. The FIA under Mr Todt is “a joke”, Mr Ecclestone said last month.
Such provocation may be a familiar refrain in the combative world of F1, but Mr Todt puts down Mr Ecclestone in his measured Gallic style. “It is important not to overreact,” he says. “I feel with confrontation, unless it is necessary to achieve a result, you lose time. I prefer to achieve results with harmony rather than confrontation.”
Mr Todt’s second aim is to extract from F1’s commercial revenues, which analysts put at in excess of $1bn a year, what he believes is the FIA’s due share.
The FIA in 2001 signed away the commercial rights to the sport for 100 years to Mr Ecclestone’s Formula One Management company for $360m. Compared with the rights value of other major competitions, sports sponsorship experts regard the F1 deal as cheap.
Mr Todt shrugs when asked if he agreed with that assessment, pointing out that since he took office FIA lawyers had trawled through the agreement and concluded it could not be altered. “It is what we have,” he said.
But Mr Todt’s opportunity to ensure the FIA gets a better slice of F1’s pie comes with upcoming negotiations of the Concorde Agreement, the tripartite deal signed every five years by the FIA, the teams and FOM to determine how the annual revenues are divided up.
“I will make sure that everybody realises that since the agreement was signed, times have changed,” he says. “Technology has changed. Evolution has a price. I must make sure that the funding for the FIA is correct.”
German authorities are probing a 2006 deal that saw Mr Ecclestone sell the F1 commercial rights to CVC, the private equity group. A banker involved in the deal is under arrest and Mr Ecclestone may be questioned by the authorities. He denies wrongdoing.
There has been talk in circles of CVC considering selling its asset. Mr Todt, while saying he believes CVC is no hurry to do so, points out that any sale needs his blessing. Under the “100-year agreement”, the FIA and its president has a right of veto if they consider the potential purchaser to be inappropriate.
“If CVC decides to sell, definitely we have a role to play,” he says. “It is my job to make sure we secure the present and the future of the FIA F1 world championship.”
As for his own future, Mr Todt, 15 months into his four-year term, said it was too early to say whether he would seek a second mandate. But he has rewritten the FIA’s statutes and appointed a new management team, and is standing on the threshold of renegotiating the Concorde Agreement. Asked if it would be impossible to achieve all his ambitions in one term, he said: “You’re right.”
Artículo publicado por Financial Times
