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Will F1 Have Additional Testing? It Just Might Happen

Just when you thought
that winter testing was limited, think again. Or better yet, just wait.

At a meeting of the
Sporting Working Group recently, (SWG) many members of its committee voted to
allow winter testing beginning right after New Year’s for 2014.

With the new turbo
engines coming out, along with other major changes, the teams will want to get
out onto the track to test their cars before the start of the season and with
all the team’s agreeing on it, the final vote will have to go to the FIA to be
ratified.

In addition, if the
idea does pass, it means that the formula one teams will not just test their
cars in Europe, but also in other parts of the world, something that McLaren
sporting director Sam Michael agrees with, but only depending on how many tests
will be done and where they will take place.

“Tests
in January are allowed; we’re not quite sure if we will end up with it,”
Michael said. “What I think we will end up with is a test in January and
two in February, something like that.

“The
advantage of being in Europe is you’re very close to base when you first run
your car. So you could do one test here and then go outside Europe The only
two changes to the sporting regs are that testing is allowed outside Europe in
pre-season and testing is allowed in January, because those are two
rules.”

Michael’s
comments might be hopeful more than positive, but it has been many seasons
since testing was allowed before the start of the year, in the middle of the
season, and at the fall part of the calendar. But costs for formula one were
very expensive, and now with testing for next season not agreed on for other personal
outside of team managers, this still means that the five teams interested in
testing, only want to test themselves for 12 days in the period between January
and February, while five other teams have agreed on 15 days of testing in the same
period of time. One team in general, wants to have just 12 days of testing
altogether.

However,
considering the idea to come up with more testing, the final decision will
probably come down to the FIA in Paris, France and this could set the goal on
what could happen for next year. The decision itself to solve this matter, will
be finalized in June and since there is no clear-cut decision of what could happen,
the final word will be made by the governing body of the sport-in other words,
the FIA. And for certain, even if the decision would be made to go ahead with
the testing itself, no matter how many days are scheduled, it could be tweaked
to show a test that could be scheduled on one certain time during the season.

One certain team, which happened to be
Ferrari, is one of the most respected teams in the paddock, and is the only
team to have been in every formula one world championship since 1950. Unfortunately, their suggestion of in season
testing to return was totally voted down. But the Scuderia also put up another idea to include a total of
nine days of in season testing, but this time, out of the 11 teams, only five
voted in favor of it, so the idea of a top team trying to put up some good
ideas were not recognized.

So
if you thought that testing could return again like the in season testing that
used to happen, think again. However, as was said in the beginning, with new
regulations coming up, it would certainly be a problem if some testing was not
allowed before the start of the 2014 season. That move has to come now and
soon.

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