Mike Krack: Budget cap breach report ‘upsetting’ for Aston Martin

Mike Krack says it was a “surprise” and “upsetting” to see Aston Martin’s name connected with a reported breach of the budget cap.

Wednesday October 5 is the date when the F1 world will find out whether reports claiming Red Bull and Aston Martin exceeded the cost cap for the 2021 season are true.

A report in Auto Motor und Sport suggested Red Bull’s breach was more serious than one committed by Aston Martin.

Krack, the Aston Martin team principal, had not been expecting the Silverstone-based constructor to be implicated as he believes they have not “done anything majorly wrong”.

“It’s a process where you give your submission and then the FIA is analysing this and comes back with questions,” Krack toldAutosport.

“And this process is still going on. So we don’t really know what will be the result. There is a discussion going on. We have questions about interpretation, they have questions about interpretation.

“And we were surprised to read our name in this thing, so let’s see. We don’t think we have done anything majorly wrong.”

While insisting Aston Martin were “not stressed” about the matter, Krack did admit it was “upsetting” that fingers were being pointed in the direction of his team.

Asked if an administrative error might have occurred, the 50-year-old from Luxembourg said during the Singapore Grand Prix weekend: “I’m not aware of one, I don’t think so.

“As I said, there were some questions which our financial people are also answering. Honestly, we need to wait what will be the outcome. But we are not stressed about it.

“It is upsetting. I think the most important thing is to keep focus on the weekend. When the Thursday or Friday starts like that, it’s important not to distract the people.

“And from our point of view, it was good that we were not the only one mentioned, so you guys (media) concentrated on the other side of the paddock! It’s unfortunate that these things come out like that, but it’s F1.”

One school of thought was that Aston Martin may have spent too much on staff wages, given their aggressiverecruitment campaignin which they have enlisted big hitters from rival teams.

“This is typical paddock, the best defence is attacking,” added Krack. “I think at the end of the day, we must not forget we are significantly less people than most teams are.

“We need to look at ourselves. You will not have a war of words from us, we need to concentrate on making progress. This is much more important than using the press to make statements.”

Aston Martin enjoyed their first double points finish in Singapore since Imola in April, with Lance Stroll finishing sixth andSebastian Vetteleighth.

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