Brawn: Gap to top three is ‘much too big’

Editor

Formula One’s managing director for motorsports Ross Brawn has said performance gaps need to be "narrowed" in order to stop the sport becoming "unsustainable".

Mercedes and Ferrari are both on their way to moving 200 points clear of third-placed Red Bull in the Constructors' Championship, who in turn are 83 points of Force India in fourth.

At the latest round of the 2017 in Hungary, only Fernando Alonso outside of Ferrari, Mercedes or Red Bull was able to finish on the lead lap, once again showing a huge gulf in performance between the teams.

“The gap between the top three teams and the rest of the grid is much too big,” said Brawn.

“This has been the case many times in the past, but the sport needs to look at narrowing these performance gaps because, in the long term, it can become unsustainable.”

No driver outside of the top three has led a single lap so far this season and Brawn wants Formula 1 in the future to be accessible to everyone by enforcing fresh engine regulations.

“What I think Formula One always has to achieve is to be accessible to the largest number of teams as possible,” Brawn said.

“Would it be great if we had 13 strong teams, with the franchise of a Formula One team being extremely valuable, and a queue of people who want to come into the sport because they can be profitable and successful?”