A white house in a red square

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Written by Kate Walker

Tuesday, 09 February 2010 18:30

I would wager an F1 team’s entire annual operating budget on the fact that this piece marks the first time in history that a Sisters of Mercy song lyric has been used in reference to Formula 1.

But Mother Russia was always a favourite of mine, bringing back as it does memories of the years I spent growing up in Moscow.

The last time I saw Red Square, it was full of tanks and parading members of the armed forces. We left the Soviet Union back when it was still called the USSR, shortly before the Berlin Wall came tumbling down and Communism in Europe breathed its last. Much has changed in modern Russia – not least the return to the pre-revolutionary name – but as we all know, plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose. Or, in English: the more things change, the more they stay the same.

There have always been two Russias, and two types of Russians: the Russia for the rich, inhabited by those with money, and Russia for the rest, inhabited by those who lack the necessary connections.

Back in the Soviet era, rich Russia was for the Party inner circle. Through diplomatic associations I had a glimpse of a world filled with velvet-lined rooms, replete with ornate samovars and people eating endless amounts of caviar on spoons made of bone or mother of pearl. Through more personal connections – family friends, or people not involved with the embassy circuit – I saw the world occupied by the rest of the population: entire families living in single-room apartments divided by curtains, the need to join a queue – any queue – in the hopes there would be food at the end of it.

Speaking to friends with more current associations with Russia, very little has changed. The Party may have disappeared, but the division between the haves and the have-nots remains extreme.

In Russia, people with friends in high places can make things happen, often more quickly than we could imagine in the bureaucracy-rich UK. Having the right friends means that all of the pesky red tape Western Europeans accept as a fact of life can be circumnavigated with ease, whether that red tape is in the form of bank loans, planning permission, or high-level business deals.

The prevailing Western assumption seems to be that in Russia, friends in high places means mafia. It may well do, in some cases. However, one cannot underestimate the power of the Old Boys’ Club – or clubs. In the UK, graduates of Oxford and Cambridge know that they can use alumni connections to accelerate their progress through the ranks of power. Ivy League connections lead to much the same outcome in the egalitarian USA. In Russia, there are a number of Old Boys’ Clubs, and some of them of them are less moral than others. Some are more innocent, however, and come from the same shared childhoods, educational backgrounds, and familial links so beloved of those in power around the world.

Much has been written about Russian newcomer Vitaly Petrov, and very little of that has been to do with his driving. Russian media outlets were yesterday reporting that Petrov may lose his Renault seat if the promised sponsorship money doesn’t hit the team’s coffers as scheduled on 1 March. Petrov’s manager has since denied the story, and I am going to believe the denial until I have reason to believe otherwise.

In case you missed the story, a thumbnail sketch: Petrov’s father told a Russian news outlet that he had been unsuccessful in securing the necessary sponsorship to further his son’s career. As a result, he applied for a €15 million bank loan, and put his house up for collateral. Due to the size of the loan, the money has yet to be transferred to him as promised, imperilling his son’s race seat. (That’s the story as I understood it, anyway – there are a number of versions in circulation.)
Among the British online media, the prevailing assumption has been mafia. After all, in order to have a house that can stand as €15 million in collateral, you have to be involved in some dodgy dealings, no? No. Not in Russia.

Fans of Russian literature will be aware of the importance of blood ties, of loyalty, and the brotherhood. All are recurring themes, for good reason – Russian culture and its people are imprinted with them. Whether this is a necessary defence resulting from the country’s turbulent history, or the need to work together for generations simply to survive the harsh climate and rough terrain, I do not know. But they are undeniably there, and remain national characteristics to this day.

Loyalty and the brotherhood are nearly enough to secure the necessary loan. Vitaly Petrov’s undoubted talent behind the wheel will have been another factor. After all, even loyalty doesn’t require throwing money into the wind. The combination of Petrov’s talent and his father’s connections may not be enough to secure multi-million pound funding in the UK, but Russia is a different culture, and a different world.

It may well be that the Petrov family has connections to unethical businessmen. I imagine that somewhere along the line we all have connections to less salubrious people, whether those connections are direct or of the six degrees of Kevin Bacon variety. But the widespread assumption that Russia + money = mafia does a massive disservice to all of those Russians who keep their noses clean and work the system as best they can.

Given the damage that Renault F1’s public profile has suffered in the past year, I believe Gerard Lopez will have done all he could to ensure that Petrov would be a scandal-free hire, and that includes checking on the young Russian’s proposed financing. There is nothing to gain in wiping the slate clean of one scandal, only to launch straight into another one, a sentiment I believe is shared by the Renault F1 board as a whole.

The Russia I grew up in no longer exists, but the people who inhabited it do. The fierce pride and loyalty that I see as hallmarks of Russian civilisation lead to a perception of the country as a closed shop, the playground of the elite. What that perception ignores is that the aforementioned loyalty is issued to the members of the club. While internal divisions exist throughout Russia, when the focus is Russia competing internationally, what was ‘Russia the haves’ vs ‘Russia the have-nots’ becomes Russia vs the world. And that Russia is a club with 142 million members, Petrov’s father included. Kate Walker for Girlracer Magazine

Comments (1)

|2010-02-09 22:29:57 Anonymous - Excellent

Excellent written piece on Russia and F1, but with a deeper search of what Russia actually is and what it could mean to the sport. Enjoyed it.
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