The F1 Strategy Group has agreed to an engine ‘unfreeze’ for 2015 which would allow in-season development – but the plan now has to be voted through by the F1 Commission.
Christian Horner said today that the teams had agreed in Singapore, but Mercedes and its customers subsequently changed their minds.
The Strategy Group, which is compromised of six teams, Bernie Ecclestone and Jean Todt, requires only a majority vote for ideas to go forward. It’s understood that in today’s meeting that Ecclestone, Todt, Ferrari, McLaren and Red Bull voted for the unfreeze, and Mercedes, Lotus and Williams opposed it. As Ecclestone and Todt have six votes each, the outcome was presumably 15-3 in favour.
Rule changes for 2015 have to receive the unanimous approval of the F1 Commission, on which all teams are represented by their bosses, along with other key stakeholders, namely Ecclestone (as its chairman), Todt as FIA president, eight race promoters, Pirelli, two sponsors (Rolex and Marlboro), and an engine supplier (Renault).
Thus in order for the unfreeze to proceed the three Mercedes teams – plus presumably Force India – will have to be convinced to support it in the Commission.
In effect they will have to agree that it will be good for the sport to give the other engine makers more of a chance to catch up.
“In Singapore, the teams unanimously agreed on a position,” said Horner. “And then, I think, subsequently from that meeting, Mercedes changed their position.
“We’ve subsequently had a strategy meeting and it’s been voted on a majority basis for that to go through to the Formula 1 Commission for in-season upgrades to be allowed.
“We’ll see what the outcome of the Formula 1 Commission vote is. The FIA are in support, FOM are in support, obviously the non-Mercedes teams are in support. So we’ll see what that holds in approximately a month’s time.
“Frozen engines: this is not Formula 1,” said Ferrari’s Marco Mattiacci. “I agree with Christian. Now we’ve had the majority of the vote to go ahead and unfreeze the engine, let’s see what’s going to happen with the F1 Commission.”
Adam Cooper F1 
For F1 to truly be F1, the engines must be open to development during the year. Who wants another season like this one, with a huge peformance advantage for one manufacture locked in for a full year? It is understandable for the Merc. teams to like the status quo, but they should consider the case where they were the ones lacking performance. Bet they would vote for the change then.
Funny, Renault and Ferrari BOTH agreed to regulations limiting engine development to 8 tokens/year when they thought THEY’D have the ADVANTAGE!
Merc did an awesome job and now they’re threatened with extrajudicial punishment for it.
BS.
I really hope the unfreeze goes through.
I hope this change happens. F1 without an engine development race is only half a sport. Who knows, Mercedes might have another 75 HP step if they unfreeze development, the gap to the rest might increase but we should find out.
Like a breast cancer victim is only half a woman?
Get a grip, Merc-hater.
Tobacco advertising is banned. Why is Marlboro on the F1 Commission???
B/c FOM is shameless in its corruption.
Not quite sure, but the Constructor reward is based on winning the title two years in a row – so it’s understandable that Mercedes would vote to maintain the status quo. Or maybe I misinterpreted the thread of conversation that took place on TV between Wolff and Jordan.