Gunther Steiner opposes budget cap increase

Gunther Steiner is not yet convinced and thinks it would not be right to increase the budget cap this year. He is unwilling to agree with Christian Horner and a number of other Formula 1 team leaders who insist that $140 million this year will not be enough to deal with runaway inflation.

Günther Steiner: “I actually believe that it was the transition to limited budgets that made Formula 1 what it is today, ie increased the level of competition. This is largely due to the new technical regulations, but it is thanks to limited budgets that the teams have come closer together in terms of competitiveness.

I know the big teams are still ahead, but their advantage isn’t that big, they’re not that far ahead of us anymore – I think it’s just due to limited budgets. That was the plan when Formula 1 switched to it. In the first six races of the season, all ten championship teams managed to earn points, as we are now closer to each other in terms of opportunities.

We must do everything we can to keep the principle of budget constraint in force, this will make the sport even more interesting. In the future, even mid-range teams will be able to climb the podium and even compete for race wins.

We do not want the level of budgets to rise, although we have agreed some adjustments, as inflation is higher than forecast. The situation is very difficult, the whole world is concerned about this, but this is how the conditions are developing, so we made some concessions and the budget cap became a little different.

But in the future we need to be more careful so that the situation does not get out of hand again, so that the top teams, who have the ability to spend more money, do not accelerate the pace of modernization too much. Then small teams can’t keep up with them.”