20/03/2009
NEWS STORY
World Champion Lewis Hamilton has joined the growing list of drivers (and fans) unhappy at the recent rule changes announced by the FIA.
In addition to a radical change to the rules in 2010, when teams can opt for a £30m budget cap in return for being allowed greater technical freedom, the FIA, under pressure from Bernie Ecclestone, is changing the way the Drivers' World Championship title will be decided. From this season, the title will go to the driver who has won the most races, a move that hasn't gone down well with fans or many of the drivers.
"I think it's a shame what's happening to Formula 1," said Hamilton this morning. "It's hard to believe that these recent decisions will improve things for the trackside spectators and TV viewers, who should always be our number-one priority, but I guess we'll have to wait and see.
"Whatever the points system, I know that all Formula 1 drivers will always race our hearts out," he continued. "For the first time in recent years we have the teams, drivers, sponsors and fans all working together for the good of our sport - now we just need the governing bodies to listen to us and help us.
"Formula 1 is the pinnacle of motorsport and that's what we all love about it; we should all be working together to maintain that."
In a sport, indeed, driving for a team, where it is rare for drivers to speak out so publicly and negatively, it is clear that there is much more to this than meets they eye.
Hamilton's words, though no doubt born of frustration, are just a little too correct, a little too corporate and in harmony with the FOTA line.
The battle lines are clearly being drawn as FOTA prepares to take on the FIA, and who better to assist in the fray than the drivers the public so readily identifies with.