The Sports Corner

Honda pulls the plug on F1 team

Honda has stunned the motorsport world with its sudden and unexpected decision to pull the plug on its Formula 1 team effective immediately.

The team and its assets have been placed on the market and Honda has warned if it is not sold by next week the team will fold. It comes at a time when increasing costs are forcing all but the largest companies out of the sport.

The Honda decision marks the first time a major car producer has walked away from the most glamorous of motorsports.

The fate of the team’s employees including team executives Nick Fry and Ross Brawn, as well as star British driver Jensen Button is unclear. Honda is hopeful that a buyer will be found and the new car which it developed will run this season under a different brand.

But it would seem hard to believe that a team which spent $680 million a year for little result would have any significant interest. Honda’s satellite team, Super Aguri Racing, folded last season after four races because it could no longer afford to follow the worldwide competition.

Only two weeks ago the manufacturers formed the Formula One Manufacturers Association who were tasked with looking at ways of cutting the escalating costs of running in the competition. Honda’s yearly budget was one of the largest in Formula 1. They bought the former BAR Racing team in 2005 and three years of disappointment finally took it’s toll on the Japanese manufacturer’s board. But at least one F1 identity, former World Champion Jacques Villeneuve, a former BAR driver thinks the reasons for the decision was not entirely financial.

“I don’t think F1 is one of Honda’s biggest expenses,” Villeneuve tells autosport.com. “But with the world economic climate as it is you have to be perceived to be making cuts… I think it’s more of a political decision.”

Honda losing face, particularly with the recent good results by main Japanese rival Toyota, could well be one of the decisions the Honda board lost patience with the sport. The team finished ninth out of ten teams in the constructors championship, only beating first year team Force India. With talented veteran drivers such as Button and Brazilian Rubens Barrichello, and a major commitment to former Ferrari frontman Brawn, the team expected a lot more.

But it was a tumultuous two years for the team who appeared to lose their way on the development of a once promising car and saw it relegated to a consistent backmarker in the F1 field.

Undoubtedly a large portion of the 700 employees of the team will be made redundant. Some will find other F1 jobs. But now with only nine teams on the grid for the 2009 season there will not be many vacancies to go around. Both Fry and Brawn are confident a buyer can be found and that preparations for the 2009 season will continue, albeit on a smaller scale. The loss of Honda will also cost the job of F1 great Aryton Senna’s nephew, Bruno Senna, who was tipped to replace Barrichello, who last season broke the F1 record for the number of race starts. Senna who was runner up in the GP2 feeder series will likely be forced back to the lower category next season.

It remains a turbulent time in Formula 1 with only three months to go until the start of the 2009 season.