So I reported in a recent video that billionaire Lawrence Stroll, father of Lance and the man who lead a consortium to buy out Force India, has been in advanced stage talks with Aston Martin about acquiring a stake in the company. The figure that’s been thrown around is £200 million for an estimated 20% stake. Now, initially and somewhat intuitively this gave rise to the idea that Stroll would be doing this in a bid to bring Aston Martin to the grid as a part of Racing Point given he already owns the team.
This in of itself raises a couple of interesting, somewhat tangential questions such as what would then happen to the title partnership currently held between Red Bull and Aston Martin? Would they part ways? Or would we end up with two teams racing under the Aston Martin name like back in 2011 when two different teams called Lotus both powered by Renault were competing concurrently, but that’s a story for another video…
Anyway, another question is what about the livery. A lot of people have suggested that Stroll is keen to bring the British racing green back onto the grid, but BWT, a current major sponsor of the team pretty much mandates that the teams they sponsor have to be ran in their colours, hence pink. Would we see that partnership dissolve or would we end up with some compromise half pink half British racing green frankenlivery? Hard hitting question, I know.
However… all of this could be meaningless chatter especially if what veteran F1 journalist Ralf Bach has come out saying is true.
Bach has recently published an article that suggests that after plans for Toto Wolff to take over as the head of F1 fell through, apparently due to Ferrari vetoing the move; or at least threatening a veto, that Wolff is now forging new plans based on the premise that Mercedes may be looking to exit the sport sometime in the near future.
A few signs point to this possibility, one of which was the new engine supply deal they struck with McLaren, if Mercedes were to leave the sport having a partnership with McLaren would give them a well-funded defacto works team on the grid and would allow them to still be involved in the sport but at much less investment.
Another potential point of interest, as pointed out recently by former F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone, is that Mercedes are yet to sign the new 2021 Concorde agreement which is basically an agreement between all the teams, the FIA and F1 as to how the sport will run, who will compete, and under what rules.
I digress… how does any of that have anything to do with Lawrence Stroll and Aston Martin? Well, it’s no secret that Stroll and Wolff have had a lot to do with each other over the past two years and as is inferred by Bach and Ecclestone, it could follow that the two are potentially playing with the idea of teaming up to buy out Mercedes when they intend to leave the sport and bring in Aston Martin during the takeover.
It’s a very interesting idea, and one is that currently based on pure speculation. For one, Mercedes and Toto Wolff have come out recently stating that Mercedes intend to stay in the sport as a full team and don’t have interest in being only a power unit supplier. And Mercedes not having signed the new Concorde agreement doesn’t necessarily mean much because last I checked, nobody else has officially signed it (correct me if I’m wrong there). And as for the link between Stroll and Wolff being frequently seen together, his son Lance has been affiliated with Mercedes based teams since at least his debut in F1 and Lawrence is a well known F1 enthusiast so he could just enjoy spending time with another person equally as passionate (although not-quite as rich) as himself.
So there you have it, a rumour-filled, eye-catching, off-season story that may have some validity or it may just be something that helps us survive the days until the season opener in Melbourne.
Fast Feed
Marko has come out saying that Gasly “should take some of the blame” for his demotion last year due to his poor approach in dealing with the deficit to Verstappen
He did however admit that that his return to Toro Rosso was “amazing”
Leclerc has revealed that the drivers, at least at Ferrari, “have no great influence” over car design philosophies
Claire Williams has “absolute confidence” her team will arrive to testing on time due to having “a huge amount of contingency time”
Bottas has revelled that there has “never been any problems between himself and Lewis and that their relationship has “never been so close”
Latifi has announced that he will be using the number 6 which was last used by Nico Rosberg
Sean Bratches is set to step down from his position at the end of January, but will continue to support the sport in an advisory role
And the Formula 2 championship will expand to a 22-car grid for the upcoming 2020 season, courtesy of Hitech Grand Prix joining the category
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