SUMMARY
- FIA Technical Director, Tim Gross leaves his position after the 2023 season.
- FIA in trouble as second key employee leavess the governing body.
Over the last few months, there has been a lot of criticism towards the FIA. A few weeks earlier, Steve Nielsen stepped down from his role as Sporting Director of the FIA. Now another key employee has left his role in the FIA and it may not be good for the governing body. This has not sit well with F1.
Ever since the new president of the FIA was elected, there have been a lot of controversial actions being taken. Mohammed Ben Sulayem has decided to take a more active role in managing operations for the FIA.
The FIA loses its Technical Director
According to the latest reports, Tim Gross who served as the Technical Director for the FIA has decided to leave the FIA. This comes just days after Steve Nielsen left his role as the Sporting Director. This has left a huge hole within the FIA.
The FIA will not only need to find the power to fill these roles but will also have to fix its image in the media. After the 2023 season, the FIA launched an investigation on the Wolff family stating that confidential information was being shared between Susie Wolff who works for Formula 1, and Toto Wolff who is the Mercedes team boss.
The FIA announces Tim Goss is leaving his role of single-seater technical director.
The former McLaren technical director is taking up a position “outside the federation”.
Tim Malyon has also been named as Steve Nielsen’s replacement as sporting director #F1
— Chris Medland (@ChrisMedlandF1) January 8, 2024
This investigation was not supported by any of the F1 teams and Formula 1 themselves. Due to a lot of negative media and a lack of support, the FIA was forced to pull the investigation. However, the Wolff family still seeks to understand who and why they started the investigation.
F1 world reacts to dramatic FIA downfall
With the 2nd key employee leaving the FIA, the public’s opinion of the governing body keeps declining. Fans have taken over the tweet by Chris Medland and have stated how the FIA is about to crumble into pieces.
Mohammed Ben Sulayem is speculated to be one of the main reasons for the recent issues they are facing. He has not been on the light side of Twitter since he was elected as president of the FIA. He was elected right after the 2021 season and has been handling a lot of problems including the 2021 season finale issues.
The FIA is in absolute shambles
— PeekPerformance | MV1 LS18 LS2 OP81 (@PeekPerfomance) January 8, 2024
After these issues, there were rumors suggesting that F1 owners, Liberty Media were thinking about leaving the FIA and forming their own individual Championship like NASCAR or IndyCar. However, there has been no official statement about this.
Another one bites the dust pic.twitter.com/kjS9u0yrt6
— Motorsport_Fan (@KJ16976372) January 8, 2024
Leaving the FIA would prove to be complicated since they run most of the operations for F1. However, Liberty Media could force the FIA to elect a new president. There is no doubt that F1 brings in a lot of revenue for the FIA. Hence the governing body cannot afford to lose Formula 1. So, the sport has a lot of influence within the FIA. They could use this influence to force a change of leadership if necessary.
It will be interesting to see how the FIA and F1 go forward in the coming days.