William’s jumps ship!
Written by Peter Gillespie · December 8, 2005
We have been speculating for several weeks on this forum, of the possibility of teams defecting from the GPMA,and now Bernie has landed the biggest of the independents, Williams!
Personally I have always wondered how comfortable Sir Frank felt as a do-it-yourself operation, sitting at a table with the Manufacturers. You can’t blame Frank for doing what he feels he must, for the survival of his team. Losing a manufacturer, Honda in ‘87 & Renault in ‘98 is a bitter pill Frank has had to swallow twice in the last 20 years. Having swallowed the same medicine, last year with BMW, he won’t have forgotten those late eighties & late nineties struggles with customer Judd’s & Supertech’s.
The difference this time around is that Frank can’t see a manufacturer lining up to bolt a block on to the back of one of his cars in the near future; in fact those same manufacturers are talking of doing the bolt. Even the rumoured Lexus badged Toyota for ‘07 would be a source of concern, it’s impossible to think that Toyota would provide a equal spec of engine & God for bid if the Williams cars were to out perform the factory team. Frank is already speaking of how damaging a split in the sport would be & urging reconciliation, but then he would say that wouldn’t he?
So where does this leave the GPMA, is Williams just an independent & therefore of no consequence in the greater scheme of things, or, is this the first crack in the GPMA? Will the GPMA negotiate as a united front, or will one of their members be the next to jump over the wall, into Bernie’s waiting arms. Should a manufacturer follow Williams, you would have to assume the GPMA will crumble as an entity.
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Next team to sign with Bernie; Toyota. Last team to come on over; McLaren or BMW.
With Renault rumored to be selling the team there is no way the gang of five can hold together, especially with 60% of the sports income laid at the paddock door sills of the teams. Transparency and losing Max would have been great as well, but the cash distribution was always the driving force of the rebellion.
GPMA: born 2004, R.I.P. 2005
I’m with you on the Toyota being first to jump angle, on the subject of Toyota, in this weeks auto sport the well respected Mark Hughes mentions the fear among Toyota’s F1 rivals of this giant flexing it’s muscles. Getting a new car out five weeks after the end of as season certainly constitutes that. Apparently the F105B that we saw at the last two races was a sort of half way house for the F106.
Although a big budget alone does not guarantee success in F1, it sure as hell goes a long way to getting you there. Are we seeing the first steps of what could become an era of Toyota dominance? Despite the fact that Toyota seem to have all of the elements necessary for success in F1, I have never understood their driver selection. Ralf is apparently on a very expensive, long tem contract, for years to come & Trulli is, in my opinion, the flakiest driver in F1, brilliant qualifier, dodgy racer. Notwithstanding the selection of McNish!! For the debut season & de Matta’s disastrous stint.
Toyota’s “new” car is highly suspect of merely being an upgrade of the “old” car, and their early roll out part of the mind games played in the sport.
In spite of all the money in the world and a highly organized effort, without the design talent and driver talent, they ain’t going any where, championship wise. When you get right down to it, how many top aero designers are out there? How many chassis engineers? And how hard it must be to pull all those elements together to form a winning combination.
Which is why I agree with Ferrari on unlimited testing. In spite of all the theoretical design computations with Cray super computers the only way to work the kinks out of a design is to test, test, and test again.
After all, money will no longer be a problem, will it?
When you get right down to it, how many top aero designers are out there? How many chassis engineers?
Gee George! Toyota’s Mike Gascoyne has a formidable record improving Jordan & Renault. He knocked off Newey & Brawn in the “how much do you have to pay a top designer in modern F1 stakes”
Only time will tell, but I’m convinced that Toyota are the dark horse of future F1.