Bernie Ecclestone says Mercedes not leaving Formula 1

Bernie Ecclestone believes Mercedes are not going to leave Formula 1 that easily.

Recently rumours of Mercedes pulling out of the sport grew ripe as contractual disagreements caused the team to be furious at the treatment they received.

Reports in the media have suggested that Formula One Management have given special treatment to Red Bull, McLaren and Ferrari in their contracts while Mercedes has not.

Under the current contract the top 10 teams share 50% of Formula 1’s profits of the prize winnings and on top of that a fixed fee is paid to Ferrari only due to the historical heritage the team shares with the sport. The new agreement will be giving money to any team that has been with the sport since 2000 without making a change to its name. More rewards will be offered to teams with back to back championships.  Also Ferrari, McLaren and Red Bull will get a seat on the board of Formula One Management.

While rumours have also suggested that Mercedes is looking into the possibilities of pulling out of the sport. Mercedes at the backdrop of all the rumours said that the issue has been drawn out of proportion and right now the likeliness of them leaving is not as much as propagated.

Ecclestone though has said that he does not believe that Mercedes will be looking to leave at all. “I very much doubt that Mercedes will leave,” says Ecclestone adding, “They are upset at the moment because they feel they are not being treated in the same way as Ferrari. Our comment is a simple one, we are treating Mercedes in exactly the same way and that is what the problem is. All of these teams’ commercial set ups are based on the length they have been in Formula One and the results whilst they were there. Unfortunately Mercedes have only been there a couple of years.”

It will be interesting to see how Mercedes take this statement from the sport’s Boss. Fans would definitely not want a top team like Mercedes to be out of the sport over such a row. The Concorde agreement will be revised by the end of 2012.

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Posted by Kashif Khan on May 21 2012. Filed under Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.