---
title: "How Red Bull’s rivals reacted to its penalties for F1 cost cap breach"
canonical: "https://readmotorsport.com/2022/10/29/how-red-bulls-rivals-reacted-to-its-penalties-for-f1-cost-cap-breach/"
type: "post"
language: "en-GB"
author: "Hamilton Lyndon-Griffiths"
section: "F1 News"
published: "2022-10-29T10:26:34Z"
modified: "2022-10-29T10:26:36Z"
---

# How Red Bull’s rivals reacted to its penalties for F1 cost cap breach

The FIA’s decision to hand Red Bull a $7m fine and a 10% reduction of aerodynamic testing for its breach of the 2021 cost cap has been met with mixed feelings among other Formula 1 teams.

On Friday before first practice for this weekend’s Mexico City Grand Prix, it was announced that Red Bull has been hit with both financial and sporting penalties for its failure to keep within last year’s cost cap limit.

Red Bull was found to have overspent by $1.8m, with an additional $5.6m related to excluded costs covering up to 13 areas.

While it “begrudgingly” accepted a settlement with the FIA through an Accepted Breach Agreement, team boss Christian Horner felt the penalties were “enormous” and “draconian”, claiming that the reduction of aerodynamic testing will cost Red Bull between 0.25s and 0.5s in lap time.

Despite Red Bull feeling it has been hard done by, rivals outfits have given their take on the FIA’s verdict from the case.

Mercedes F1 chief Toto Wolff had been vocal in hoping the FIA would take appropriate action to Red Bull’s breach and praised the governing body for being “robust” even if it deemed the penalties were not harsh enough.

“I think the most important thing for me is there is a robust governance,” Wolff told Sky Sports F1. “They didn’t bat an eyelid, they just followed the process.

“Federico \[Lodi, FIA head of financial regulations\] and his team, Sheila Ann \[Rao\] and Nicholas \[Tombazis\] were absolutely good in assessing.

“I know how rigorous they were with us, all throughout the year – that was a difficult process.

“When I am seeing 13 positions that were wrong, with us that wasn’t the case.

“It is good to see that there is a penalty, whether we deem it too low or too high.”

Ferrari made its feeling clear that it was “not happy” with the FIA’s penalty, arguing the amount Red Bull overspent was worth as much as “a couple of tenths” per lap.

The Italian outfit also believed the overall effect of the penalty was “very limited”, claiming Red Bull could spend money in other areas where it has not been penalised.

“As for the penalty, we are not happy with it, for two important reasons,” said Ferrari sporting director Laurent Mekies, as quoted by Motorsport.com. “The first is that we at Ferrari do not understand how the 10% reduction of the ATR can correspond to the same amount of lap time that we mentioned earlier.

“Furthermore, there is another problem in that. Since there is no cost cap reduction in the penalty, the basic effect is to push the competitor to spend the money elsewhere.

“It has total freedom to use the money it can no longer spend on use of the wind tunnel and CFD due to the 10% reduction, on reducing the weight of the car, or who knows what else.

“Our concern is that the combination of these two factors means the real effect of the penalty is very limited.”

McLaren team principal Andreas Seidl said what while he was pleased to see the FIA take action, he felt Red Bull’s punishment did not fit the crime it had committed.

“In the end, on a positive side I think it’s good to see the FIA did a good job in terms of doing the audit,” he told Sky Sports F1. “Nine teams got it right and it was clear one team was in breach, so that’s a positive outcome.

“But on a negative side, it’s also clear, from my point of view, that the penalty doesn’t fit the breach. I just hope moving forward we have stricter penalties in place.”