German Car Zone

To my knowledge Renault's budget was over 250 million (witch is rather low vs. the german/japanese/Ferrari brigade)
120 to 125 million alone was spent on the engine operation/facility.
150 million isn't enough for some teams for the engine opeations/facility.
Ferrari gets from Marlboro/Altria Group 200 millions per year.

Realistically you'd need to cap the budget (to still let it be F1 = high tech + high performance) at somewere between 250 to 300 million (this judging by Renault standards).

Now back to TC, I think things will be worse.


Why:

- from a techonlogical point of view it's a step backward, and F1 is about excellence in design and engineering too
-- many top of the range family cars are now more advanced in some areas than the 2008-spec F1 cars in that department

- even less overtaking
-- like in the case when banning active ride (along with the rest of the active ride technologies) and then slick tyres, both witch were suposed to aid skilled drivers, cars becamed way more accident prone, thus drivers becamed (very) causious switching to pit strategy instead of wheel to wheel overtaking.

TC ban 'won't improve racing'

By Jonathan Noble Monday, April 2nd 2007, 12:38 GMT

The ban on traction control in 2008 is unlikely to lead to dramatically better racing, even though it will help those drivers who have more finesse with the throttle.

That is the view of leading technical figures, who think that the ban will not add much to the spectacle of Formula One - although it will hurt those drivers who are unable to look after their rear tyres through good throttle control.

Williams technical director Sam Michael told autosport.com: "The drivers will have to be more gentle with the throttle. They are really going to have to learn to feel it like they used to. So it will be like before Barcelona 2001 (when traction control returned).

"But the racing will not be much different. There may be a few more mistakes and the drivers will have to take care of the rear tyres – so those who can feel the rear tyres and the throttle will shine.

"But I would be very surprised if the racing will be more exciting to be honest."

Spyker chief technology officer Mike Gascoyne added: "As always I don't think it will make any difference to the racing at the front of the grid."

Michael claims that the teams are going to have to work pretty hard to revise their cars to accommodate the ban – because traction control has become such an integrated part of modern design.

"There will be a lot of work on our part as all the systems now work in conjunction with traction control," he explained. "It is true it has become cheap to do the system, as we have been developing it for many years, but you cannot deny it does take away from the drivers.

"There is full automation now – so the drivers just go flat on the throttle. No finesse is required right now, as electronics do everything for them."

But despite uncertainty about the impact of the traction control ban, both Michael and Gascoyne are confident that the introduction of standard ECUs will ensure there is no return to the cheating accusations that flew around the last time traction control was banned.

"With the standard ECU it really made sense to get rid of traction control," said Michael. "I suppose it is the right way to go, as there will be no more cheating stories."

Gascoyne added: "Theoretically with a standard ECU there should be no chance of anyone cheating as in the past. Also the FIA now have access to all the data from the car so it would be much more difficult than it was in the past. But never say never..."


Source Autosport

This will be great news for Button but bad news for people with an agressive driving style such as Alonso!

I don't know if it's a good or bad idea, if it helps the racing then that's good, it will show more of driving skill which I like!

Alonso drove without TC both in F1 (example Turkey GP 2006) and before reaching F1 (he raced and won from since he was 3 until to the age 19 on non-TC cars, carts, open wheelers).
Alonso's so called style was adapted to the car, at it's composing elements were used before TC in F1.

Alonso's style used on the Renaults consisted of a combination:

- early curve/turn entering just like Jim Clark (1963 and 1965 WDC; considered by some, including J.M. Fangio as the greatest F1 driver ever)

- the agressive turn/lock first used by Jochen Rindt (WDC 1970) and then by E. Fitipaldi (WDC 1972 and 1974)

- and (numerous) minor corections just like A. Senna (1988, 1990 and 1991 WDC)

On the McLaren he changed somewhat being no longer as agresssive. His method was perfect for turning an understeer proned Renault into a very fast car, wereas Fisico usually couldn't (thus he could be even as much as 2 seconds slower per lap).

As for Button, TC or not, he's not very adaptable and unless the car is perfect, he won't do much.

Great news IMO. That's all.

Why exactly ?!

Every "show-the-driver's-skills" action FIA took made F1 more and more boring.