Adam Cooper F1

Max Mosley has lost the latest battle in his campaign for tighter UK privacy laws after a judgement today from the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

Since leaving the FIA presidency Mosley has focussed much of his attention on the matter in the light of the scandal exposed by the News of the World.

He has been campaigning for individuals to be informed of upcoming stories so that they would have a chance to get an injunction to prevent publication.

In the case of Max Molsey v United Kingdom the seven-judge court decreed: “The European Convention on Human Rights does not require media to give prior notice of intended publications to those who feature in them.”

The judges couldn’t find any example of such a process in law and in essence supported the UK legal system: “The current UK system fully corresponded to the resolutions of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe on media and privacy.”

The judgement said that in the UK the right to a private life was protected by a system of self regulation of the press, and by access to civil courts to seek damages, adding that “if individuals were aware of an intended publication touching upon their private life” they could still seek an interim injunction.

Williams has anounced its annual results for the year to December 31  2010, the first such report since the company sold shares to the public.

The team’s turnover was £91m – down from £108.3m in 2009 – but reported profits, after investments in new subsidiaries were taken into account, were up from £4.5m to £5.8m. The numbers also show a much reduced debt.

Sir Frank Williams said in a statement: “Commercially, 2010 has given Williams a solid foundation from which to grow. Amidst one of the harshest sponsorship environments for a long time, we signed Petroleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA) and upgraded and extended existing partners, Randstad and Oris. This year has seen us build on that with our joint venture with Jaguar Land Rover and we are looking forward to further developments with our new businesses, WHP and WTCQ.”

Adam Parr added: “We are pleased to report a solid set of results for our shareholders. We enter 2011 in a stronger financial position with a strategy to take the business forward again over the coming years. Our March IPO and listing on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange demonstrates investor confidence in Williams, and secures the team’s long-term future by providing a sustainable ownership structure.

“A core element of the strategy set out to investors in March was a partnership with a leading car manufacturer. Our new association with Jaguar Land Rover, announced this month, demonstrates the strategy is on track.”

For those who can translate them the full numbers are as follows. (EBITDA is earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation!)

• EBITDA on a like for like basis up 25% to £12 million (2009: £9.6m)
• Reported EBITDA up 5% to £10.1 million (2009: £9,6m)
• Profit before tax on a like for like basis up 33% to £7.7million (2009: £4.5m)
• Reported profit before tax up 28% to £5.8 million (2009: £4.5m) after investment of £1.9million in Williams Hybrid Power and Williams Technology Centre Qatar
• No tax charge for the year. Estimated carry-forward losses for taxation purposes of approximately £88 million
• Turnover of £91 million (2009: £108.3m)
• Cash at hand more than doubled to £27.2 million (2009: £13.2m)
• Cash generation strong, debt reduced to £2.4 million (2009: £9.3m, 2007: £24.8m)
• Williams Hybrid Power’s flywheel contributes to Porsche’s race success with its 911 GT3R Hybrid
• Williams Technology Centre Qatar partners with Sainsbury’s to leverage F1-developed vehicle simulator technology for the UK supermarket’s drivers to enhance energy efficiency and safety

Sebastian Vettel may already have a commanding lead in the World Championship, but his team boss Christian Horner is adamant that there’s no room for complacency given that three teams are leading the chase.

Ferrari, McLaren and Mercedes have all given Red Bull a hard time over the last couple of races, and with everyone throwing updates on their cars Horner says that the balance of power may shift over the coming races.

“They’re all great teams,” said Horner. “It would be a foolish person to write off Ferrari, and Fernando in particular. McLaren made a big step just on the eve of the championship, and they’re quite capable of making another big step. And Mercedes are showing real flashes of pace.

“So you can’t underestimate any of our rivals. We’re trying to focus on our own performance and keep learning and keep delivering the kind of performance that we saw today.

“It’s fantastic to be heading to Barcelona with a 43 point lead in the constructors’, and Sebastian is 24 points in the drivers’. But as we all know those points can vanish pretty quickly. We gave away 43 points pretty easily here last year, so it was a very sweet victory today 12 months on.

“The bottom line is things can change so quickly. Fernando gave us such a hard time today, nobody else seemed to be in the same ball park. Three weeks ago it was McLaren, and it looks like Mercedes have made a step.

“Once you hit the sweet spot there’s quite a big performance return from that. We can’t afford to be complacent. We just keep our heads down, keep pushing, keep trying to optimise, keep trying to learn and get performance to the car. That was our 18^th win in two and a bit years, so we’ve come a long way and we’re building on that experience.”

Ferrari team principal Stefano Domenicali has reiterated that Ferrari has to improve its qualifying form after another strong race in Turkey – and he hopes to be able to force Red Bull into making mistakes.

Ferrari has set good times in race trim all year but Fernando Alonso has been compromised by starting fifth and having bad first laps.

“Overall we have improved, if you see the gaps in qualifying, we have reduced that,” said Domenicali. “In the race pace, I think we have reduced that [gap], but it was already good. The outcome of it is that we need to improve in qualifying, that’s for sure the thing that we need to make happen, starting already in Spain.

“We need to work all around the car because with such a competitive situation if you lose one area it’s difficult because the others will take advantage. For sure the area where we need to maximise our effort is on the aerodynamic side, and in qualifying also the usage of the exhaust system connected to the floor and that specific point.”

Domenicali didn’t want to elaborate on why the car was weaker in qualifying, but suggested that there was no obvious handling issue.

“I think that we have some ideas, because from a balance point of view we have some comments that are quite neutral in that respect. So we have ideas where we believe that is the area where there is something to work on, and this is the area where we should concentrate ourselves to improve that.

“If you look from the outside it’s difficult to explain to anyone why in qualifying there is such a gap, and in the race you are so competitive. I think we have understood, now we need to react already in Barcelona if possible.

“For sure this is what I’m expecting from my people, my engineers. I think that at least what we have seen this weekend is going in the right direction, and I’m expecting another step in that direction because if we do that it means two things, one we have understood the situation, and secondly we are working in the right direction.

“What I’m saying to my people is don’t think that the others will stay asleep. For sure all the other competitors will react and improve. I think that this year will be a very challenging season. We have seen so many different conditions, apart from the fact that the Red Bull was always the fastest car and the more reliable.

“But we will see. The pressure could also be on their side to keep that level of performance. So we will try to be one of the teams that will make the pressure on them. If there’s pressure they can make mistakes.”

Jean Todt has declined to give his viewpoint on the News Corp/Exor bid to get involved in F1, other than saying it was ‘strange’ that the story had come out before it was clear whether CVC was willing to sell.

Todt has confirmed that the FIA has a veto on any sale.

“I heard about and I even spoke to some people who are involved in that,” said Todt. “I have very simple comments. As you know FIA is the regulator of the sport and is not involved with commercial matters. F1 commercial rights do belong to CVC.

“So from what I know CVC has not the intention to sell. If it will be true in five years, 10 years, honestly it’s not a question for me, it’s a question to CVC. If one day CVC is deciding that they want to sell the rights they have for the commercial organisation of F1, as president of the FIA if I am still by then the president I need to speak with my people in FIA to give the agreement whether we’re happy with the people who will take over or we are not happy.”

“I feel it’s strange [for someone] to say we want to buy before we know it’s for sale. I think the first action would be for whoever is keen to take over the commercial rights to find out with CVC what is the situation.”

Pushed for his opinion, he said: “I’m sorry but there is no validity for this question. Maybe Coca-Cola want to take over. First CVC must be willing to sell. Why should I answer a question without knowing… For the time being CVC doesn’t want to sell.”

Regarding the prospect of the owner of Ferrari getting involved, he said: “Exor is the family company from the major shareholder of the Fiat Group. You have other examples in F1 where you have some organisers who are shareholders of some teams [ie Bahrain/McLaren, Abu Dhabi/Mercedes]. It’s just a kind of personal opinion the first people who should be involved are the owners of the actual commercial rights.”

Regarding criticism of the teams’ interest in the bid from Bernie Ecclestone, Todt said: “It would be completely inappropriate to react to what you heard. For me as president of the FIA we would all be stronger if we worked together instead of against each other. It’s a fact of life, you know. And it’s what I’ve been trying to do since I am head of the FIA, if we are able to have the teams, the commercial rights holder, the FIA as the regulator, working politically and hopefully with the media.”

Jean Todt has made it clear that he has no intention of dropping or postponing the 2013 turbo rules, despite opposition from Bernie Ecclestone and most of the teams.

He made the point that both Bernie and vocal opponents Ferrari had voted for the new rules.

He also confirmed that there will be a meeting at the Spanish GP where engine makers will discuss their progress with the FIA.

“Before I was elected at the FIA it had been decided to freeze the V8 2.4 engine until 2011, first,” said Todt. “Then it was decided that it was going to be postponed to 2013. In the mean time the engine working group, it’s the FIA technical people, it’s one representative of each engine supplier from the present time, from potential participants in the future, and they all came out with the proposal of engine rules for 2013, which was presented to me.

“I made some comments, and they unanimously proposed that. The next step is to have that voted through the WMSC. It was unanimously voted.

“Who is part of the World Council? We have 26 members and among the members you have two representatives of the F1 world, one of which is the oldest team representative, which is Ferrari, and the other one which is the representative of the commercial rights, which is Bernie Ecclestone. I repeat it was unanimously agreed. So in 2013 we will have the introduction of the new engine.

“Incidentally, because I’m happy to listen to comments, in two weeks time – on Saturday May 21 – I’ve asked our people to make a meeting in Barcelona with all people involved in engine regulation – most probably I will make my best to attend this meeting to hear the point of advancement, of the development of this engine. I must say I’m very happy to welcome a new entry as an engine supplier, which is a company called PURE. And that’s where we are.”

Todt did concede that sometimes circumstances changed but made it clear that there would have to a big reason to adjust the 2013 rules.

“In the next meeting we could say, if we have some strong new evidence – because we are in a world where things change, again it’s not only our little world of F1, you have other things happening in the world – dramatic things could happen and then we could reconsider something. But at the moment there is no reason to reconsider it because it has been unanimously agreed, again after lengthy discussions and meetings with people who are involved in this business.”

The FIA has told teams that DRS will be used in Monaco, this blog can exclusively reveal.

Some teams and drivers had asked that it be disabled for the weekend on safety grounds, and there was a discussion on the matter in the drivers’ briefing in Turkey. Mark Webber was the most vocal opponent, citing safety concerns.

Teams who wanted to keep DRS pointed out that they would be forced to hurriedly develop ‘normal’ Monaco wings if DRS was banned.

Race director Charlie Whiting informed the teams this morning by letter that having taken various opinions on board, competitors would be free to use DRS during the weekend.

At the moment the intention is that the race DRS zone will be on the pit straight rather than through the tunnel and into the chicane

Bernie Ecclestone has spent much of today fending off journalistic enquiries about News Corrp/Exor’s interest in buying into F1, mostly with snappy one liners.

However he has given a bit more of an insight into his position in a Q&A on his own http://www.formula1.com website. It’s never easy to second guess what his real agenda is, but he seems to be genuinely annoyed by recent developments.

Bernie played down News Corp’s confirmation of its interest.

“Somebody might say that they want to do it, but it doesn’t mean that when somebody wants to buy something the owner wants to sell,” said Bernie. “And CVC made it very clear that they don’t want to sell.”

Asked if F1 would continue unchanged, he said: “Yes, because if people don’t want to sell, others have to accept that fact. It’s as simple as that.”

Elaborating on Rupert Murdoch’s interest, Bernie made some interesting comments on recent dealings with his company.

“Murdoch hasn’t got anything really big to drive their TV audiences and Formula One would be good for that. They have been trying to buy the TV rights from us for a long time, but we won’t because they are not free-to-air television broadcasters. They are a subscription service.

“Very recently they wanted to do something in Germany, in the UK and in Italy, where they are, but we couldn’t do it. Sky is doing an incredible job but if you look at their audience they are nowhere. With these figures it would be almost impossible for teams to find sponsors. That would be suicidal.”

Bernie agreed that the current healthy state of F1 had attracted the interest of potential buyers.

“Probably, but firstly they didn’t know if it was for sale, and secondly they didn’t know what the price tag was. I would never start to say that I’m interested in something without knowing how much it is. There have been so many rumours out there lately and I go along with Colin Chapman – why spoil a good story with the truth?”

Inevitably he had a viewpoint on suggestions that several top teams will meet next week to discuss the future. Bernie said he had not been contacted about the meeting.

“No. But I thought that Ferrari won’t need to go because one of the people who hopes he’s going to be an investor owns Ferrari, so that whole story sounds a bit weird. You have to be careful about such rumours, but then again rumours are part of Formula One and always have been.

“I hope these people come to their senses. The teams should be happy to have somebody like CVC not selling to the wrong people, trying to maintain a good level for them and supporting me so that I can go to work and earn some money for the teams.”

Lewis Hamilton hasn’t given up his hopes of a good race tomorrow despite being disappointed to be bumped down to fourth by Nico Rosberg.

Traditionally Istanbul is a track where cars in the less favourable even numbered grid slots suffer more than elsewhere.

“Obviously we’re starting on the dirty of the grid,” said Hamilton. “It’s going to be very, very hard to get ahead of the Mercedes, they’re very quick on the straight. The Red Bulls will disappear, because it’s too easy for them. But you never know what the weather’s going to do. We’ll put up a good fight like we did last year and in the last race. Fingers crossed, we can gain some places.”

In China Hamilton saved a set of new option tyres for Sunday, but he was unable to do it this time, although both Red Bull drivers have.

“I wanted to do the same thing, and we ended up going out and doing two runs, which is not necessarily the right thing to do. Last race with the extra set of tyre we didn’t benefit much from them, so it’s difficult to know how much the benefit will be.”

Michael Schumacher was frustrated to qualify only eighth in Turkey after looking good in FP3.

Schumacher was second fastest and only 0.001s off Sebastian Vettel in the morning session. However in qualifying he was five places and 0.7s behind team mate Nico Rosberg, who was third.

“I’m not happy at all,” said Schumacher. “It’s so far off, that’s a bit unusual. It didn’t really work out at all, for whatever reason it wasn’t there compared to what I had this morning.

“I struggled already in Q2, the track certainly was better than it was this morning and we couldn’t reproduce what we did this morning. We have to understand what’s going on. The more I pushed, the more things went wrong. Just at the end there was no grip left.”