'Did Red Bull Racing use that money for bread or an extra upgrade?'

According to Nico Rosberg, the FIA is in a situation with Red Bull Racing in which F1 can only lose. The question now is which solution the sport's governing body will opt for following Red Bull's budget cap breach.

After the Japanese Grand Prix, it became clear that Red Bull Racing had indeed exceeded the budget cap. Red Bull itself disagrees, stating that according to its calculations it was four million below the budget cap, but the FIA's calculations now show otherwise. Competitors are screaming for the highest possible penalty and so the FIA is in an awkward position.

FIA faces important decision

''It's such a difficult one to answer at this point because we all don't even have details on how it was breached, and certainly that's relevant. What was done with the extra money that was used? Was it to buy sandwiches, or was it to develop the car with one extra upgrade? I think it's so difficult to judge it from the outside. I think it's best that we just wait and be patient,'' Rosberg said at Sky Sports.

The current situation does put the FIA under a magnifying glass. Too light a penalty could cause more teams to exceed the budget cap in the future and too heavy a penalty (for example, taking away Max Verstappen's titles by points deduction) damages the sport's image.

''For the FIA, the problem is, it's really a lose-lose situation because if they would really take points away for last year's championship, worst case even points from Max, that would be really bad for everybody. But if they did a serious cost cap breach of a couple of million or whatever, and it really gave them a performance advantage, if they don't go in very hard and aggressive then that's also a lose-lose. It's so difficult and I hope the FIA manages to find the fine line and get it right, we need to wait and see though,'' the former world champion concluded hopefully.