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    Formula One Team In It

    Honda pull the plug

    With Ferrari also threatening to pull out for "taking their ball home" reasons rather than financial ones, it could be that F1 in a couple of years will be Lewis Hamilton driving round on his own in a McLaren while everyone politely applauds.

    #2
    Formula One Team In It

    Jenson Buttons quite probably screwed for a drive next year then. Quite right too as he can't drive round any problems. Very bad news for the sport though. Anyone else drops out and Bernie will have to fund someone himself. i

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      #3
      Formula One Team In It

      Of all the teams you would have said might fold, Honda would have been one of the last, what with the monstrous company behind them. However, monstrous companies run up monstrous debts, I imagine.

      I'd love to see the 'books' at McLaren and Ferrari right now! I bet that Ferrari will pull out because all their red paint has been used up in their accounting logs.

      Meanwhile, Max Mosley - Mr Logic himself - has gone on record saying that costs are spiralling out of control and that the whole circus might soon become "unsustainable". So - fining teams £50million is a way to ensure their continued survival is it, Max? Still, I suppose that's an easier way to raise funds than to go to a struggling bank and beg for £50mil, so that teams leading exorbitant lifestyles can have their unrealistic cars go round in circles some more.

      Twat!

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        #4
        Formula One Team In It

        I've got quite alot of admiration for Honda. They really do have a strong R&D ethos, even to the point where they have traditionally spent more money on R&D than marketing. They are currently (including F1) involved in 23 different types of racing, on land sea and in air.

        However $200million is an awful lot of money to be spending, especially if any chance to really innovate is going to be removed from the sport.

        I don't think it is totally a cost thing but as much a realisation that the development aspect of the sport is being drained away.

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          #5
          Formula One Team In It

          Not just F1, now World Rallying is suffering as both Japanese manufacturers have withdrawn from the 2009 WRC.

          It really will be strange to see a championship without the iconic blue Subarus next year, but hopefully the 'new for 2010' S2000+ regs can be hammered out soon and entice Peugeot, Abarth and Skoda back into the WRC fold, along with privateer efforts from Proton and GM (with tacit factory approval).

          http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/moto...ly/7785299.stm

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            #6
            Formula One Team In It

            Ricky Lenin wrote:
            ...the development aspect of the sport is being drained away.
            Agreed. This is a big bugbear for me. I love Formula 1, but even I have to admit that it needs some justification for its existence when the teams are spending well over a combined billion pounds a year (and rising) on it.

            My suggested solutions to this would be for the rules to be changed to make it more directly relevant to road cars and their development. This would entail allowing most of the gadgetry related to making the cars safer. However, the main changes I would like to see are as follows:

            Capacity of the engines reduced to 1 litre (possibly with turbos). Before the engines were 3.5 litres they were 1.5 litre turbos. However before that, they were 3 litre normally-aspirated engines. I don't understand why this extra .5 of a litre was tacked on the end when they banned turbos and enforced naturally-aspirated engines again. Personally I don't give a shit about what sound an F1 engine makes - if they want to wring 200mph out of a 1 litre engine, I'm sure they'll soon find a way of doing it.

            Engines possibly all diesel and possibly running on pure vegetable oil too (which increases fuel consumption and can simultaneously increase power too). The last three Le Mans-winning cars have all been diesel.

            The tyres should all be manufactured from 'road-going' compounds. This would encourage devlopment of road-going tyres, hopefully leading to better durability and safety.

            Quite frankly, I don't really care if they end up all having to drive go-karts, but I'm increasingly finding the F1 circus unconscionable.

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              #7
              Formula One Team In It

              I may have mentioned this elsewhere, but why isn't there a electric/hydrogen/non-petrol open wheeled class competition?

              I know it wouldn't be able to compete with F1 at the moment but given time and the sort of development that racing teams have traditionally been proud of surely it's somethign for the future?

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                #8
                Formula One Team In It

                Not strictly open wheelers, but the French ice racing 'Trophee Andros' is pioneering electric cars.

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                  #9
                  Formula One Team In It

                  I am waiting for Volkswagen (maybe Audi) or Porsche to get in. Then I'll show some interest.

                  There are rumours about this floating around in Germany, but then again, they have been floating around for years.

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