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Toyota to cut costs but vows to remain in F1

Toyota will scale back costs on Formula One racing, but is vowing not to drop out despite expectations it will record its first yearly operating loss in seven decades.

Toyota Motor Corp. President Katsuaki Watanabe did not give details on how the Japanese automaker would cut spending in the glamorous but expensive F1.

Toyota has not had an F1 victory in seven years.

“To keep it up at the current level is extremely difficult,” he told reporters. Watanabe said F1 was a good way to attract young people.

Earlier this month, Honda Motor Co., Japan’s No. 2 automaker, announced it was pulling out of F1.

Japanese automakers have been battered by the downturn in the US auto market, the world’s biggest. The slowdown is spreading to other regions, including emerging markets, where they had been holding up. In recent weeks, Subaru and Suzuki have both quit the World Rally Championship, citing concerns about the global economic crisis.

Fuji Heavy Industries, which makes Subaru cars, announced the decision earlier this month, a day after fellow Japanese automaker Suzuki Motor Corp.’s departure.

Toyota is expecting to eke a net profit for the fiscal year ending March 2009, as it racks up its first operating red ink since it began reporting such numbers in 1941.

The only other time it has ever had an operating loss was unofficial, in 1938, a year after its founding.

Toyota had been on track to sell 10 million vehicles around the world, but now sales for 2008 are expected to slide below 9 million vehicles.

Honda has also slashed its fiscal year profit forecast. Its global vehicle sales will show negligible on-year growth at 3.77 million.

Honda President Takeo Fukui looked crestfallen when announcing the decision to quit F1, but he said Honda needs to focus on its core business to ride out hard times. He reiterated last week again that the withdrawal wasn’t temporary.

F1 stakeholders announced measures to reduce the costs for teams in 2009 in the wake of Honda’s withdrawal and the earlier departure of Super Aguri in April.

Auto racing governing body FIA and the teams agreed to a series of changes which include longer-lasting engines, limits on expensive testing and cheaper, off-the-shelf engines for smaller teams.

The FIA said the first batch of changes for the 2009 season will help the larger teams cut costs by about one third over 2008.

Rossi: I could have been a good F1 driver

MotoGP world champion Valentino Rossi said on Thursday he could have been a good Formula One driver if he had made the switch three years ago.
Rossi tried out Ferrari’s 2008 F1 car at the Mugello circuit as a gift from the Italian team after his eighth motorcycling world title.

Moto GP World Champion Valentino Rossi looks on during the first training session in his 2008 model Ferrari Formula One car at the Mugello racetrack, northern Italy, November 20, 2008. [Agencies]
He had serious tests for Ferrari in 2005 and 2006 but decided to stick with two wheels.
“With a lot of work I could have become a good F1 driver. It is hard to say if I would have become a winner or not, but the potential was there,” he told reporters after a strong test.
Rossi managed a fastest lap of one minute 22.5 seconds, less than two seconds behind recent times recorded by Ferrari drivers Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen on the same track.
Wearing his distinctively-coloured helmet, he was roared on by around 1,000 fans and could have gone faster had his 51-lap run not been cut short by an approaching thunderstorm.
The chances of Rossi ending up in Formula One look to have gone but the 29-year-old has talked about the possibility of moving into rallying permanently when he finishes with MotoGP.
The Italian was second in the Monza rally last weekend and is due to race in the British round of the world championship next month.
Ferrari’s seven-times champion Michael Schumacher has entered occasional motorcycle races since retiring in 2006 while rally champion Sebastien Loeb tested for the Red Bull Formula One team in Spain this week.

Hamilton sees tough year in 2009

Lewis Hamilton believes cost-cutting changes will make it “very tough” for him to repeat as Formula One champion next year.
Governing body FIA and the F1 teams agreed to a series of measures for 2009 last Friday, which include longer-lasting engines, limits on expensive testing and cheaper, off-the-shelf engines for smaller teams.

McLaren’s Formula One driver Lewis Hamilton of Britain and Ferrari’s Felipe Massa (background L) of Brazil wave to the crowd before the Brazilian F1 Grand Prix in Sao Paulo Nov. 2, 2008.(Xinhua/Reuters Photo)

“I don’t think it will make it easier,” Hamilton said on Tuesday. “With the new regulations it’s going to make it very tough to win the championship again.”
The sweeping changes come as automakers reel from the global financial crisis. Honda pulled out of F1 this month after Super Aguri quit in April. FIA said the first batch of changes for 2009 will help larger teams cut costs by about one-third over 2008.
“We have less testing obviously but I think we as a team are in a position to pull together and make a difference in some other way,” Hamilton said. “But everyone’s in the same boat.”

Formula one driver Lewis Hamilton poses with the trophy during the 60th Bambi media awards ceremony in the southwestern German town of Offenburg Nov. 27, 2008.   (Xinhua/Reuters Photo)

Changes to be introduced after next season will be even more radical with races maybe shortened to save money and refueling banned, which could dramatically alter the spectacle for fans.
Hamilton’s McLaren team boss Ron Dennis called it a “challenging period.”
“It’s amazing how many different things happen in a year but all we’re thinking about is how we can continue in the sport and continue to put on a good show,” Hamilton said.
Hamilton missed out on becoming the first rookie champion by one point last year, but rebounded to become the youngest F1 champion at 23 in November – by a single point.
Hamilton overtook Toyota’s Timo Glock on the final bend at the season-ending Brazilian Grand Prix to finish fifth and secure the title after Ferrari’s Felipe Massa had won his home race as he needed to.
Hamilton expects more of the same close racing next season despite the dramatic changes. “We don’t know who’s going to be quick, surely we’re going to be at the front, with Ferrari maybe, BMW, but you never know. Maybe there’s going to be a fourth team up there with us.”
Hamilton added that becoming F1’s first black champion “was hard” because of having “to break down the barrier and it was not easy but we got there, and I have been accepted very well.”

Australian Grand Prix reports heavy losses

The Australian Formula One Grand Prix lost a record A$40 million ($26.7 million) in 2008, organisers said on Thursday.

The announcement came just months after the Victoria state government and race organisers agreed to underwrite the costs of staging the event until 2015.
Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone had threatened to dump Melbourne from the calendar after 2010 unless organisers switched to a night race to accommodate European television audiences.
Local officials refused to stage a night race but agreed to a compromise with a twilight start time.
They signed a five-year extension to 2015 in July, despite criticism that the race was becoming an unnecessary burden on taxpayers.
Organisers lost $35 million on the race in 2007 and Australian Grand Prix Corporation chairman Ron Walker said the losses were likely to continue in future years.

Massa promises a clean race

Brazilian Felipe Massa, who races for the Ferrari Formula 1 team, announced on Monday that he has no plans of playing dirty in order to win in next Sunday’s race in Interlagos, Sao Paulo.
The race will decide the winner of this year’s World Championship of Drivers.
On one of his many promotional appearances, Massa took time to stop by an elementary school in Campo Grande, Sao Paulo. In front of more than 400 kids, Massa gave a motivational speech to the children and teachers alike. Apart from donating more than 1,200 books to the school’s library, the driver also inaugurated the reading room of Felipe Massa.
In relation to Sunday’s race, the Brazilian needs to win the race and hope that his rival, Lewis Hamilton, does not arrive better than sixth place. In order to win, Massa hopes to do his best and promises a clean race.
“Playing dirty has never been part of my game. I don’t want anything to do with it. The only thing on my mind is winning the race. The rest does not depend on me. If I am champion, it will be a dream come true. If not, that’s OK, I will try again next year,” said Massa.

Formula One champion Button attends book signing in London

World Champion Formula One driver Jenson Button of Britain poses during a book signing in London, November 19, 2009. (Xinhua/Reuters Photo)

Brawn sheds light on Honda buyout

New owner Ross Brawn said on Tuesday he had not hesitated in taking over Honda’s Formula One team because it would otherwise have been closed down with hundreds of jobs lost.

“If I am frank, there were no choices,” the Briton told reporters during the second day of testing Brawn GP’s new Mercedes-powered car at Barcelona’s Circuit de Catalunya.

“If the management group, because it is not just myself, had not taken this task on, there would be no team. Then all of the staff would have been made redundant.

“It wasn’t a difficult choice in that respect. Things can go wrong, but we are optimistic and if we can capitalize on the performance of the car, and the car looks good, then I think the team have got a future.”

Honda, Japan’s second largest carmaker, announced in December that it was pulling out of Formula One due to the credit crunch. It had employed around 700 people at their Brackley factory in central England.

Black days

Brawn said there had been some “very black days in trying to keep the team alive” but a majority of the staff would now be kept on.

“It is fair to say that we will have to look at the size of the team because we have gone from a manufacturer to a privateer,” he said.

“It is not going to be an easy process but I think everybody in the team understands the situation and the team survives. And it will give a career to a majority of people.”

Brawn said the team had a secure budget for this season but now needed to address the longer term and find sponsors and partners.

“We are completely flexible on what we do in the future, but I hope we will have a proper long-term planning and proper structure for the team going forward,” he added.

Brawn’s Brazilian Rubens Barrichello did 111 laps and was third fastest on Tuesday, building on teammate Jenson Button’s impressive Monday session.

Brawn, the master-strategist who guided now-retired Michael Schumacher to a record seven world championships with Benetton and Ferrari, explained that his team had decided to use Mercedes engines this season simply because they fitted the chassis better than Ferrari ones.

Schumacher ‘really sad’ about canceling comeback

Michael Schumacher called canceling his much-anticipated Formula One comeback a “really sad moment.”

Former Formula One driver Michael Schumacher reacts as he attends a news conference in Geneva August 12, 2009. Seven-time world champion Schumacher has cancelled plans of a temporary return to Formula One with Ferrari because of fitness concerns, the German driver said on Tuesday. [Agencies]
He had wanted to help the Ferrari team by replacing injured driver Felipe Massa but was unable to do so because of lingering pain from a motorcycle crash six months ago.
“It’s a really sad moment, probably one of my toughest,” Schumacher said. “I felt back alive and now I had to cancel all this.”

The German, who retired at the end of the 2006 season after a 15-year career in which he won 91 races in 250 starts, said any talk of later returning to F1 was speculation.
“From a purely medical point of view, there are no reasons why that couldn’t be the case. But it’s certainly not a topic that I’m considering right now,” he said.
Schumacher, visibly subdued sitting between his doctor Johannes Peil and manager Willi Weber, said the euphoria surrounding his possible return was “extreme, and so of course the disappointment is extreme, too.”
Peil said it was a fracture at the base of Schumacher’s skull that prevented the return, rather than the fractured vertebra and rib he also hurt in the bike crash earlier this year.
It was too early to say whether the injuries would heal enough to allow Schumacher to make a later comeback, Peil said.

Subaru joins the exodus amid credit crunch

The World Rally Championship lost one-third of its teams within 24 hours when Subaru announced yesterday it was following Suzuki out of the competition.

Both Japanese automakers cited concerns about the global economic crisis for quitting the sport.

It leaves Citroen and Ford as the only manufacturers in the FIA WRC competition for next season and it followed the shock decision of Honda, Japan’s second biggest car manufacturer, to withdraw from Formula One.

Fuji Heavy Industries, Subaru’s parent, announced the decision yesterday.

“We will not contest the 2009 FIA World Rally championship due to the pressures of the global economic crisis that spread from the US financial crisis that began this Autumn,” FHI president Kyoji Takenaka told a news conference. “The automotive industry worldwide, whether they are in developed on non-developed countries, have been hit hugely.”

An FHI statement said: “In order to optimize the management resources and to strengthen further the Subaru brand, FHI decided to withdraw from WRC activities at the earliest timing.”

Subaru has been involved in the WRC together with Prodrive, a British-based auto sports group, for 19 years and has won three constructors’ titles and three drivers’ championships. It was third on the standings this season.

Car makers worldwide are under intense pressure to reduce spending as demand has dried up in recent months.

Honda announced it was pulling out of Formula One on December 5, a day after announcing it was cutting jobs in Britain and Japan and reducing its annual production of consumer cars.

F1 unveiled cost-cutting measures for teams in the wake of Honda’s withdrawal.

WRC organizers have bigger problems, with only four teams backed by two manufacturers remaining.
“Subaru’s departure from the World Rally Championship is a great loss as it is one of the sport’s icons,” Prodrive Chairman David Richards said. “The Subaru World Rally Team has created true champions such as Colin McRae and Richard Burns.”

Massa not to be underestimated

Felipe Massa can go from being one of Formula One’s more underrated drivers to world champion against the odds in his home Brazilian Grand Prix on Sunday.
 

Only this season has the 27-year-old Ferrari driver, who would be Brazil’s first world champion since the late Ayrton Senna in 1991, managed to emerge as a genuine contender.
Even if the seven points separating him from McLaren’s championship leader Lewis Hamilton prove a gap too far at Interlagos, Massa can still end the season as the driver with most race wins.
He has already eclipsed team mate and 2007 champion Kimi Raikkonen to emerge as Ferrari’s leading driver with a contract to the end of 2010.
It is all a far cry from his early days with Sauber and, more recently, as a supporting act for Michael Schumacher and Raikkonen at Ferrari.
Massa’s talents have always been evident, but so too have his flaws.
Former Ferrari driver Jean Alesi tipped the Brazilian for greatness when he first saw him drive a Formula One car, maybe because the fast and furious Frenchman saw a kindred spirit.
“I think he’s a future champion,” Alesi said before Massa’s race debut with Sauber as a 20-year-old in 2002. “I’ve watched him testing… and he’s mad, fast and clever.”
CRASH-PRONE
As Sauber soon discovered, he was also expensively crash-happy.
Hired to replace Raikkonen, Massa failed to replicate the Finn’s impressive debut season and was dropped after a year.
Managed by Nicolas Todt, son of then Ferrari team boss Jean, Massa was rescued by the Italian team who appointed him test driver for 2003.
At Maranello, the Brazilian learned his craft from the master — seven times world champion Schumacher — in a year that he has likened to being at university. The close relationship forged with the German continues to this day.
He returned to Ferrari-powered Sauber in 2004 and when Ferrari’s Brazilian Rubens Barrichello moved to Honda at the end of 2005, it was Massa who was given a one-year contract to replace his compatriot as Schumacher’s loyal number two.
With Raikkonen’s move to Ferrari from McLaren an open secret and Schumacher still undecided about retirement, Massa was still in danger of being squeezed out after just one season with the champions.
Schumacher’s departure ensured he stayed in 2007 but even then speculation about Massa’s future refused to go away after double world champion Fernando Alonso fell out with McLaren.
NEVER WAVERED
Massa has never wavered, answering those who dismissed him as championship material by going faster than ever. He has won five races this season, adding to five from previous seasons, and notched up a string of pole positions.
It has not all been plain sailing, with the Brazilian failing to score in the first two races of 2008, but he has enjoyed changing perceptions.
“People always put me completely out of the game. Nobody expects you to do a good job and then you do a better job than everyone thinks and it’s even nicer,” he said recently.
“I’m sure if I started my career as a Ferrari test driver my reputation would have been completely different. Because of the first year, which was bad, my reputation was bad for so many years.
“I made some good results, scored some good points and made some good races,” he said of that first year.
“But I made some very bad races as well. That was not a great thing for my image and it took very long to recover and change my image in Formula One. But, fortunately, I think we changed it.”
Sao Paulo is where Senna was born and buried but Massa was much more of a Schumacher fan as a youngster.
The Brazilian started in karting, while also driving his father’s car in Sao Paulo long before legally allowed, and moved into full time racing in Europe after abandoning his marketing studies.
His parents were comfortably off but not wealthy. When he arrived in Italy in 2000 to enter the Formula One Renault championship, he had a budget only for the first six races.
Massa overcame that by winning his first two races, a success that led his team to continue their support. He went on to win the title and the European championship.