Evil_Capri

Wish it weren't so, but maybe it is for the best . .

The Jaguar brand and Ford Motor Company withdraw from Formula One at the end of 2004 and Ford puts its Formula One businesses up for sale:

Joe Greenwell said, "Jaguar's presence in Formula One has been a valuable marketing and brand awareness platform particularly outside our main markets of the US and the UK. However it was our collective view that it is time for Jaguar Cars to focus 100% on our core business."


After a thorough review over many months Ford Motor Company has decided it can no longer make a compelling business case for any of its brands to compete in Formula One. Having reached this decision our focus has turned to securing the best future for our Formula One businesses and our employees in these businesses going forward. We are therefore putting our Formula One businesses up for sale

http://media.ford.com/article_displa...ticle_id=19179

And . . .

http://www.pitpass.com/fes_php/pitpass_new...es_art_id=22345

Not sure how much I will watch F1 anymore. (Even though the Jaguars, along with Jordan & Minardi are not competitive, I still pulled for them.)

f1-cobra

It is sad to see this happen, but F1 is a very expensive sport and anything other than a budget of 700 or 800 million will leave you at the back of the pack. I was kind of hoping that the money I give Ford for my Mustang would play some sort of part in seeing them do better in the sport. Who knows, maybe they will be back after all of the profits roll in on all of these new cars.

mustangfun101

I thought Ford was the key manufactuer/backer for the US F1 team search.

f1-cobra

That's the Red Bull Driver Search,

Danny Sullivan heads that in order to get Americans in F1. There was talk last year that Red Bull wanted to make an all American F1 team and tried to buy out Jaguar from Ford. I don't think that Ford is involved in this driver search.

Moosetang

I hated when McClaren was dominaant but I watched becuase there was still interesting racing. I haven't watched in over a year, becuase it just makes me sick. Teams spend millsions of dollars with ZERO hope of winning a race. I got nothing against Schuey, but this Ferrari Dominance has just gone too far. You can't ask these teams to shell out that kinda dough for a HOPE of a 3rd place finish. Just seeing how many famed teams have closed up in the last couple years should be evidence enough.

I don't think Red Bull's gonna bother buying Jaguar racing unless they see a real chance at winning. Its just silly to get in right now. They'll end up bought by some outfit that thinks just running is a priveledge, and they'll gallantly pull up the rear gain.

Maybe when Bernie finally DIES or GPWC gets going the state of affairs will change, but otherwise look for Jordan and Minardi to go through the same thing.

DanS.02GT

This could be very bad. Worst case scenario, there may only be 7 teams left in F1 next year. And those teams may not be able to afford to run 3 cars each to bring the field up to the required 20 cars.

Also, we don't yey know how this will affect the Rocketsports Jags in Trans-Am, or if Ford will continue their sponsorship of Champcar.

scottie1113

I think it's sad, but I've been following F1 since the early 60's and the one thing that has been consistent is change, except for Ferrari. They've always been there.

Yes, they're dominant this year, but let's see how things sort themselves out in China in a few hours. There's always the possibility of a sea change.

captin kapla

I find F1 really boring to watch on Speed TV. Too many gizmos in the cars and too much money to run.

Jaguar should stick with the Trans-Am series until the aluminum 2006 Jaguar X150 sports car is made for racing. Jaguar won the Trans-Am manufacturers championship this year and last year.

Here is a 4.5l, 650 hp Jaguar V-8 that Rocketsports Racing made for the Trans-Am series. It is production-based (the Jag V-8 is NOT a Ford V-8) and has 425 lb-ft of torque and revs to 9,000 rpms.