Brabham in F1? - Not if Sir Jack Gets His Way
Sir Jack Brabham and his family on Thursday issued a statement making clear they had nothing to do with a proposed new Formula One team that has lodged an entry for the 2010 championship.
And the family threatened to take legal action after discovering that their name was being used by Brabham Grand Prix without any prior consultation.
“Sir Jack Brabham and the Brabham family have expressed their surprise at the recent news reporting that an entry has been submitted for the 2010 FIA Formula One World Championship by Formtech, with the intention of operating as Brabham Grand Prix Limited.
“The family would like to make it clear that they are in no way involved with Brabham Grand Prix Limited and received no consultation regarding the company’s plans to resurrect their historic name in Formula One.
“The family is taking legal advice and will take necessary steps to protect their name, reputation and its goodwill.”
Sir Jack Brabham won the drivers world championship three times and ran his own eponymous team that was later bought and run successfully by Bernie Ecclestone, who is now F1’s commercial ringmaster.
The new Brabham Grand Prix enterprise has been set up by Formtech founder German Franz Hilmer with ex-Super Aguri technical man, Briton Mark Preston, as technical director.
They confirmed on Thursday that they had lodged an entry for the 2010 F1 world championship.
The original Brabham team won four drivers’ titles, two constructors’ championships, 35 wins, 120 podiums and gained 40 pole positions between 1962 and 1992.
After Sir Jack Brabham himself, the team employed drivers including Niki Lauda, Graham Hill, Nelson Piquet and Damon Hill.
In a statement the ‘new’ proposed Brabham team said: “We appreciate the FIA rules for cost-capped F1 teams and are convinced that the budget limitation is a contemporary obligation and will effect a revitalisation of the Formula 1 World Championship.
“We would be happy to enter into Formula 1 as a cost-cap team and to meet the challenge under the new rules.”
Hilmer, a successful German businessman, last year bought the assets of the collapsed Super Aguri team, including headquarters at Leafield Technical Centre in Langley, transporters and cars. The FIA is expected to announce the line-up for 2010 on June 12.
Image is from the 1966 German GP held at the Nurburgring - Brabham is shown at the wheel of his Brabham-Repco BT19 followed by Denny Hulme at the first corner. Brabham won this race, his fourth of the season thus far, while Hulme’s engine expired. (Photo via Jack Brabham)
The same year Sir Jack Brabham became the first and only driver in Formula One history to win a world championship in a car bearing his own name.
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Suit them back into the stone age Jack. Unless of course they give you lifetime paddock passes for as long as the team can survive with your great name attached. And a little green wouldn’t hurt either.
Filed your entry yet George?
Everyone else is.
The only way to rid the world of Manipulative Max is to allow all these new “teams” to come into the sport, have the mfg.’s leave, and have a grid full of nobody’s for a year or two, with no fans watching and no sponsors willing to pony up funding for a lackluster series.
And the mfg.’s will not start their own series. In the best of economic times it would take a boatload of money and lat east a year or two to commit TV coverage, circuits, sponsors, etc.
Bluff, Bluff, Bluff. The mfg.’s wont start their own series, I’m not even convinced they will walk away, at least not all of them.
Firstly they have all invested too much in F1 to leave, and secondly……where would they go? Sportscars? Nah!
If they walk it will have to be be out of F1 7 out of top line motorsport for a while. Look a BMW, they spent a fortune buying Sauber & then invested a mint into upgrading the team, would they really abondon all of that investment.
BTW, if they have a problem with the two-tier rules & would like the technical advantage being offered, all they have to do is spend to the budget cap. Why would you want to spend more to be restricted in what you can do with the car?
Two tier rules were supposed to get scrapped, along with raising the bar on the cap to 60 mill, no? I think the current regs Max is stuffing down everyone’s throat is a single set of rules under a single cap plus additional exclusions.
Regardless of the investment the big teams have made, they can all afford to close the shops for a while or use their assets to race elsewhere. Ferrari, BMW, M-B, Renault, even Toyota, can refocus and race in other series. McLaren may have issues finding a place and car to race.
I look for Max to do some serious back room politicking to all of the remaining FOTA teams and offer them a last second reprieve: Take the 2010 season under my rules and I’ll allow you all in. In spite of your illegal applications which I encouraged you to file. This will allow Max to toss the marginal new teams and accept the stronger applications into next year’s grid. If they can make it. USGP, Lola, and Prodrive is my guess, plus a couple more if Renault and Toyota bow out.
It’s all that second hand motorcycle dealers from Croydon fault Brabham should be left in peace !±
Art, I think we both know Bernie had long been away from Brabham when they went into a inglorious decline & crash.
Hey, what the hell! Yeah lets blame Bernie.
[...] for “Brabham” was filed with the FIA and was very quickly followed by Sir Jack Branham making it painfully clear they had nothing to do with the entry and “is taking legal advice” in the [...]