F1 waters down plans for faster cars

Mercedes protested against radical changes – why would they want to agree to changes that might jeopardize their dominance

(GMM) F1's plan to radically speed up the cars for 2017 has been watered down.

That is the claim on Monday of the authoritative German magazine Auto Motor und Sport.

It said that at the last meeting of the technical working group, a majority vote decided that the chassis bodywork should not be widened to the planned 180 centimeters, but instead remain at the current 140cm.

Correspondent Michael Schmidt added: "The larger diffuser also appears to be off the table." Earlier, it was planned that it would be 25 centimeters high in 2017, but it will now either stay at 12.5 or be only slightly raised.

"It is rumored that the concerns of Mercedes and Pirelli made the difference," he explained.

"Pirelli threatened exorbitant tyre pressures as a safety measure if laptimes were five seconds faster. Nobody wants that," said Schmidt.

However, the plans for wider cars overall – including wider front and rear wings – are still on track, Auto Motor und Sport added.