F1 » FIA examining legality of Toyota F1 departure

Ah but Tom had more savvy than anyone in management at Toyota in Sportscars or F1... He even turned a Volvo Estate into a race winner in the BTCC! His qualifying lap at Bathurst in the V12 XJS was awesome too, irrelevant to this discussion, but awesome all the same! Had the pleasure of witnessing a few of his drives back in the day!

yeah, Max's great cost cutting initiatives like KERS and the V8 rather than detuning the V10 which would have helped with the reliability issue. The evil men do lives after them.

The FIA is illegal! The brave new business-model of F1 which Max and BE are supporting has botched. Door is open for F1 of the future to take shape, with independent, nimble, innovative teams. But nothing is going to change while MXs+m is in "imaginary control" of F1 and BE managing F1 like a decadent traveling amusement-park! The roof is caving in and Bernie still dellusional about adding more venues!! I predict more teams will be calling quits and other sponsors pulling the plug to stop the "bleeding" in their grossly underperforming F1 programs by year-end.

Typical FIA bluster. If Toyota were to go totally & utterly belly-up, and ceased trading immediately would the EffIA still try to enforce the signed agreement. Shame on the FIM for blackmailing Kawasaki, but for FIA to follow suit is par for the course. Recent events may never have arisen had it not been for all the shenanigans in F1, and the iron fist of MM & BE. Despite what is said in front of the cameras, I find it hard to believe Teams are truly in favour of racing in the dark,or at strange times and what about the poor spectators who may have to travel long distances after these events. What about the huge use of energy lighting such races.

let them go, contracts seem to be worthless in F1

Paddockman you are right about Howett but not of Toyota.

Had their been 10-13 teams of indies in this current climate they would fall by the wayside just as quickly if not quicker. Red Bull and their sister team Toro Rosso and Force India are at the mercy of its Billionaire owners. When Red Bull have a dip in sales along the scale of the auto industry do you think they would be on the grid next season?

Williams business model is all about survival so its racing will never be the force it once was.

Brawn would not even be on the grid without Merc or Ferrari.
I predict Renault will withdraw their team giving their place to sauber while still supplying engines to the "indies"

Serves FOTA right for opposing the cost cutting budget cap. All very well sitting on your high horse and pillory SIR Frank Williams for dissenting but downsizing to suit a budget cap would have been a LOT easier for the team bosses to swallow than now telling ALL their employees they are out of a job when the parent company pulls the plug.

Breakaway series doesnt look so bad now does it ???

At last after all the bluster and threats, we have the breakaway series. BMW, Honda and Toyota have broken away.!

All of these comments are based on the cost alone being the reason that Toyota has bailed. The costs have gone down such that Toyota could have continued with a much lower budget that in the past, so perhaps its not the money, or at least not that alone.
May be its rules like no more KERS, no engine development, limits on special materials etc, rules that restrict the innovation that was once the bedrock of F1. Perhaps it was the rush to hold GP's in markets that were not important to a manufacturer and the lack of GP's in markets that are? It might be they are fed up with Bernie and they way he rules things, perhaps Todt getting the job was the last straw?
Just a thought.