While the mid-season milestone of the world championship has just been crossed, and the Hungarian Grand Prix will be contested on Sunday, the great circus of Formula 1 is preparing to enter a zone of turbulence, that of the transfer market. Opaque and ultra-competitive, the latter is governed by its own codes. Cyril Abiteboul, former director of Renault F1, deciphers them for Franceinfo: sport.
Every mid-season, it’s the same refrain. The paddock hums with a melody that is whistled by word of mouth, punctuated by the almost imperceptible sound of the rumor. Welcome to the game of musical buckets. The championship is already well underway, some drivers have shone, others have disappointed. And then sometimes there are also those who, like Sebastian Vettel, give up their place. It is then time for the stables to go hunting.
And this one is pretty wild: “Things are not structured like in other sports”points out Cyril Abiteboul. “Each team has its calendar and its context. What determines the transfers is the meeting of the contractual situation of the teams and the drivers. It depends on the duration of the contract and the options of each”he announces in the preamble.
Despite this apparent abundance, “There are still great moments in a season, it’s a little before the summer, during it, and just after”, continues the ex-boss of Renault. And the latter to support his point with a concrete example: “When the team has just signed a driver and wants to be reassured about its choice, it is after a few Grand Prix, generally between Monaco and Barcelona, that it already puts in an option for the following season with this driver. “.
And if, to take up the scenario put forward by Cyril Abiteboul, the driver involved does not give satisfaction? “When we want to change drivers, we push back the contractual milestones as much as possible and, towards the end of the summer, we switch to another option”, he replies. However, it would be wrong to believe that the driver is only a puppet in the hands of team managers.
“The balance of power in the negotiation is determined by sporting or financial reasons. Whoever has the upper hand over the other determines the calendar. When you are in a dominant position, you can afford to drag on for a very long time”, details Cyril Abiteboul. The latter, from the top of his experience in the paddock, however points out an important detail: “When they are intelligent, the pilots do not only look at the current forces at the time of engaging with a team, they extrapolate on what will happen tomorrow, even the day after tomorrow..
For the driver, it’s about being in the right place at the right time.
Cyril AbiteboulFrance info: sports
Then begins a treasure hunt in the corridors. “The drivers therefore go fishing for information, seek to know what will be the future engines, the evolutions of the team’s organization chart…”lists our consultant. “I remember when Lewis Hamilton went to Mercedes [en 2013], everyone was skeptical. Today no one asks the question about the relevance of his choice.” The opportunity for Cyril Abiteboul to recall a golden rule of this sport: “In F1, there is a power of instantaneous results which obstructs the overall vision but you have to know how to see further”.
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However, it should not be imagined that the transfer market in F1 is akin to the Wild West. The pilot is not left to himself, far from it. “The contractual framework has been fairly secure since 1991 with the creation of an independent entity, the “Contract Recognition Board”, which records all pilot contracts” explains Cyril Abiteboul. “It is based in Switzerland and functions as a notarial office: it receives the documents under seal and has the authority to issue, in the event of a dispute between a driver and a team, a judgment which will bind all the parties involved.”
The universe is therefore not so ruthless even if, obviously, F1 is not a matter of altar boys. “Once the contract is registered by this commission, there is a real respect for the contractual provisions.Before signing, it’s a bit of a jungle…” recalls the former director.
There is a certain code of conduct but in this environment where everything is geared towards results, you have to expect anything. And whoever does not will always fail.
Cyril AbiteboulFrance info: sports
The latter details this strange ballet: “Negotiations are always done in a hidden way. We go looking for information, we have doubts, suspicions… Sometimes the teams voluntarily leak certain elements, we also play with the media… In short, all shots are allowed But, once the music stops and the contracts are signed, they are respected”.
Framed by law, the transfer market does not therefore obey any other general rule since, as Cyril Abiteboul concludes, “the economic equation of each driver, according to his results, his sponsors, the budgets he brings to his team, is unique”. And, as often in these cases, the teams do not all occupy the same place at the negotiating table. “The most powerful teams will be able to give themselves as much time as possible to make their choice because, in F1, they are the masters of the clocks”.