On Thursday 24th of February, Vladimir Putin ordered Russian Troops into Ukraine on a ‘peacekeeping’ mission. Which soon turned into bombing, by land, sea and air. The action of the Russian dictator has been widely condemned and brought sanctions from countries across the world.
While F1 pales into insignificance in the grand scheme of war and turmoil between the two countries at the moment, it has affected the sport in a couple of ways.
On Friday we learned that the Russian Grand Prix would be cancelled while the situation remains as it is. (We imagine this will be quite some time, certainly cancelling at least this years race)
The other way in which the sport has been affected by the conflict has been with one of the sports smallest teams.
HAAS are sponsored by Russian Billionaire Dmitry Mazepin, whose company Uralkali are the title sponsor. Within this sponsorship is the promise of a seat in the team to Dmitry’s son Nikita Mazepin.
In the short term on Friday, the third day of pre-season testing in Barcelona, the team chose to remove all Uralkali/Russian colours from the car. Going back to a plain white and black livery for the day.
Rumours are now circulating the paddock that Uralkali will be dropped completely this week from HAAS sponsorship and along with it, the driver Nikita Mazepin will lose his seat in the VF-22.
This will leave HAAS having to find a new title sponsor and a new driver.
According to the current rumour mill, this is where German based 1&1 comes in. They currently sponsor the team but will be upping their investment to become the main partner moving forward.
The drivers in contention to replace the Russian youngster are Pietro Fittipaldi, Antonio Giovinazzi and Super-sub Nico Hulkenberg. Pietro is currently the obvious choice to be placed in the soon-to-be vacant seat, as he is their reserve driver. But rumour suggests that Guenther Steiner favours the German Nico Hulkenberg.
HAAS are no strangers to sponsor trouble, in 2018 the title sponsor of the team was a young energy drinks company by the name of Rich Energy. The owner decided not to pay his way and also slated the team very publicly on twitter calling the car a “Milk float”.
The team are currently working on, a way out of their current contract with Uralkali with lawyers. We should be finding out in the coming weeks as we get ever closer to the season starting.
Who would you like to see replacing Mazepin?