Mosley tells FOTA teams to go pound sand

Motor racing head Max Mosley has told Formula One teams to set up their own series if they are not prepared to compete under rules laid down by the governing body.

"I say (to them): If you want to formulate your own rules, then you can organize your own championship – assuming the rules satisfy the safety requirements," he told Swiss weekly Motorsport Aktuell.

"But we have the Formula One world championship and we make the rules for that," he added in an interview conducted at a Formula Two race in Valencia last weekend.

"We've been doing it for 60 years and we'll continue to do it in the future. Now we have a dispute and we'll see who prevails."

The FIA plans to introduce an optional £40 million budget cap next season to keep teams in the sport and encourage new ones to enter at a time of global recession.

Ferrari boss Stefano Domenicali said last week that if the nine FOTA entries were not accepted as a whole, and subject to the conditions laid down by them, they would be invalid.

The FIA is due to publish its entry list on June 12.

The standoff has been complicated by at least 10 applications from teams eager to enter Formula One under the proposed budget cap. Meaning the FIA does not need any of the FOTA teams to have an f1 series next year.

They include familiar names from the sport's past such as Lola, Brabham and March as well as a Kuwaiti-financed Prodrive team that is likely to compete eventually under the Aston Martin sportscar marque. [Editor's Note: Meaning Max Mosley is telling the teams we don't need you FOTA. You will play by our rules or you can go pound sand. There is only one F1 series and anything else you try to do on your own will be meaningless. We'll see who blinks first, but you can bet it won't be Mosley.]