Autosportfoto

Head: F1 2017 rule changes will only help big teams

Former Williams F1 team owner and technical director Patrick Head says the rules changes for 2017 will only help the big teams and will do nothing to close up the field.

Speaking in an interview with the Guardian this week, he pointed out that regulation changes only ever widen the gap between those at the top and those at the back.

"If anybody was thinking of these rules with the aim of closing the field up then they've got rocks in their head," he told the 'paper.

"Any time you make significant changes the advantage will always go to the bigger teams, because they have more resources, they have more capability to parallel develop their existing car and work on design of their new car.

"When you have 750 employees or more against, say, Force India's 300, of course the bigger teams can do more. [So] any idea it will close the field up is nonsense."

Head also warned that the new rules might not necessarily be a bad thing for Mercedes and that the engine will remain key even under changes that see aero pushed more to the forefront again.

"What makes the engine fractionally more important is that with more downforce, which they will undoubtedly have, your percentage at full throttle - the percentage of the lap at which you are power limited rather than grip limited - will be higher, so if you have that bit more power it will give a slight advantage," he explained.

As for if there will be more overtaking, Head doesn't think that will happen either: "If they wanted a formula that allowed for more overtaking without using artificial aids like DRS then they needed to go for a formula that reduced downforce levels but they have gone in the opposite direction.

"We'll just have to wait and see [though]. If they're not successful, they'll probably have another go..." 

Zdroj: crash.net