Formula One News — May 2009

BMW has announced a loss in the first quarter of 2009 of $73.7m, but this was greeted as good news by the stock exchanges which had been expecting worse figures.

The Formula One Teams' Association (FOTA) meets in London tomorrow to consider the latest moves by the FIA. The recent World Council meeting voted through a series of things that FOTA is not keen on, notably the budget cap and the system by which the World Champion is etablished by the number of victories, rather than by the overall points tally.

In the next few hours the Donington Park planning permission will be under scrutiny again at a North West Leicestershire District Council meeting in Coalville. This will review the decision taken in January regarding the development of the circuit.

David Richards has made much of his plans to enter F1 in 2010 with a new team but it remains to be seen whether this will actually happen and what it might be branded. One option would be Prodrive although this would have no obvious economic benefit for the company and it would be much wiser to use the Aston Martin brand, which Richards also controls.

The European car industry could be turned on its head if a deal being proposed by Fiat's chief executive Sergio Marchionne comes to fruition. Marchionne has done a good job in recent years reviving Fiat, but the company still has debts of around $8.8bn.

The announcement of the Formula 1 budget cap and the obvious distaste of the idea on the part of Ferrari was a sign that the deteriorating relationship between Ferrari and the FIA was continuing. Now that McLaren has been humbled, Ferrari is the team that looks likely to move into the FIA firing line.

Today was the 15th anniversary of the death of the Ayrton Senna, the last Formula 1 driver to be killed in a Grand Prix car. Today there is only one driver left in Formula 1 who was at Imola in 1994 as a F1 driver and Rubens Barrichello did not race that day because he had had a huge crash on Friday.

The Chrysler Corporation, one of America's Big Three car companies, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy after failing to reach an agreement with its creditors. The news means that Fiat could end up owning the business.