F1 CEO hits back after McLaren boss Zak Brown begs FIA to change ‘outdated’ rule

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Visa Cash App RB CEO Peter Bayer has hit back at Zak Brown of McLaren after calling on the FIA to change Formula 1’s rules owing to his team’s relationship with Red Bull.

The Faenza outfit have sparked some frustrations amongst the F1 paddock as they transition from AlphaTauri to Visa Cash App RB. A new name for 2024 is not the only adaptation at the squad once called Toro Rosso as RB will work closer to the parent Red Bull team than before.

Red Bull GmbH rebranded its junior team for the second time as Visa Cash App RB aim to be more than just the finishing school for Red Bull Racing’s future F1 drivers. But in their efforts to improve, RB will forge a closer technical allegiance with their Milton Keynes counterparts.

Visa Cash App RB now share an enriched relationship with the Red Bull Formula 1 team

Visa Cash App RB have bought as many parts from Red Bull as are allowed with F1’s current rules. The VCARB-O1 also shares many similarities to the RB19 which Max Verstappen drove to the 2023 world championship. He won 19 of the 22 Grand Prix for a record of 575 points.

One of the defining similarities of the VCARB-01 and RB19 is Visa Cash App RB’s decision to embrace pull-rod front suspension like Red Bull. Their two cars also share a similar radiator intake. Visa Cash App RB have also bought Red Bull’s gearbox and rear suspension package.

McLaren chief Zak Brown urges the FIA to change F1’s ‘outdated’ multi-team rules

Fears surrounding the heightened relationship between Visa Cash App RB and Red Bull were already growing before Daniel Ricciardo and Yuki Tsunoda revealed the VCARB-01. McLaren CEO Brown told the FIA to create swift changes to F1’s rules on A and B teams this January.

“The rules need to be reviewed and modified quickly,” McLaren chief Brown exclaimed, via quotes by RacingNews365. “I think the A-B team ownership is now outdated for the reasons they were put in place many years ago. It was before we had a budget cap and had a huge disparity between our budget, Mercedes’ budget and the Force Indias of the world.

“It was intended to help the smaller teams. Now that we have a budget cap that I believe everybody is pretty much running at, it’s a much more financially fair [and] equal playing field. Therefore we need to maintain fairness for the fans and fairness for the sport. To have teams teaming up, I think is against the spirit of what the definition of a constructor is.”

Visa Cash App RB CEO Peter Bayer hits back at the focus placed on his Faenza outfit

Visa Cash App RB CEO Bayer has now hit back at the criticism his team have faced from the likes of McLaren’s Brown regarding their enriched affiliation with Milton Keynes. The former FIA executive director of Formula 1 believes the focus on Faenza comes from being a threat.

“One of the first things you learn in Formula 1 is that the easiest way to become unpopular is to be successful,” Bayer has now told RacingNews365. “As long as you’re last, people will not even realise you’re there.

“As soon as you start knocking on the door, they will throw everything at you that they can. I’m coming from the FIA and I know how much scrutiny there is on all of the teams.

“Certainly, there is even more scrutiny when it comes to the teams working closer together. The rules are very clear. You might have seen the statement of the FIA when they looked at our car, [it said] ‘this is a different concept’. There is nothing that concerns us.”

The statement Bayer refers to came from the FIA’s head of single-seaters, Nikolas Tombazis, in December. He stated that the FIA believes Visa Cash App RB showed ‘completely different aerodynamic solutions’ to Red Bull and that there was no evidence of a direct collaboration.