The Brawn Ultimatum? Or Just Sour Grapes?

The FIA’s International Court of Appeal meet in Paris Today to consider the legality of the diffusers used by the Brawn, Toyota and Williams teams at the first two Grands Prix of 2009. And here I was thinking that 2009 was going to be a great season, free of controversy!

Now I know it is hard for me to be fair (as a Brawn fanatic), but it seems to me to be a case of sour grapes!  Brawn, Williams and Toyota have just been more intelligent with their designs and the likes of Ferrari and Red Bull simply can’t handle that.

I think BMW motorsport director Mario Theissen put it best when he said "It is good to have fresh people, fresh teams [up there], and good to have a different picture from time-to-time. I would just wish that everybody plays on the same playing ground," read between the lines…It is great to have new teams on top…..but BMW aren’t one of them so things need to change because we weren’t good enough in our car design.

I would also argue that if the teams were that confident that the diffusers are illegal, why are they developing their own?  I wonder whether Brawn, Toyota and Williams will have to submit technical drawings and specs of their designs? I bet the likes of Red Bull and Ferrari would be very interested in seeing such designs (just to check their legality of course….they wouldn’t be interested in copying would they?).

I know a lot of people on blogs and other websites have primarily blamed Ferrari for this appeal but I think Red Bull are the ones to look out for.  Think about it, Ferrari, McLaren and to an extent BMW all pushed right up until the end of 2008 whilst Brawn, Toyota, Williams and I expect Red Bull all turned to 2009.  McLaren have admitted that they focused too heavily on 2008 (and are actually keeping rather quite about the diffuser issue).

Ferrari too have stated that they concentrated too much on 2008, I think they are cruel to appeal, but I also think they are desperate.  They may have won the constructors last year but we all know they wanted the drivers’ title. I think BMW are bitter that they seem to have missed their chance to capitalise on a weaker McLaren and Ferrari year.  But, I think the real baddies in this story (as a Brawn fan and a Toyota driver) are Red Bull!

Red Bull have always threatened pace, but never really built a good enough car.  This year they made a great car, but it wasn’t great enough.  Vettel has been very fast and could have scored very high points in Australia if he hadn’t crashed.  I just get angry when I watch Adrian Newey accusing Brawn of being cheats!

I think the rest of the grid need to realise that they were beaten fair and square, not by one team, but three.  I hope that the FIA agree with me and that 2009 continues to be an exciting and productive year for the team I love.  Brawn, Toyota and Williams deserve to be where they are now!