Prodrive to buy 00 Motorsport

Amaroo Park · 8 May 2002, 09:48 (Ref:280080)

According to Auto Action (I know, I know a very unreliable sourse) Prodrive is looking to buy 00 Motorsport from Bob Forbes. Apparently Forbes was looking to step back from team ownership at the end of the year and Prodrive are keen to do a direct link between Prodrive UK, Tickford and a V8 team to market the Ford performance product much the way HRT and HSV has been done.

calais · 8 May 2002, 09:55 (Ref:280088)

"auto action".
as soon as i read that i know there is no truth to the story.
should be renamed "auto fiction"!!!!!!

what happened with the tickford link to seton's team????

StuiE · 8 May 2002, 10:28 (Ref:280105)

that team seem to be going though as much hands as a .... actually, i wont say.....

Lets hope they do a good job, and AA is telling the truth(yeah, Right)

D.R.T. · 8 May 2002, 11:11 (Ref:280156)

I'm wondering how many more Bull$%#@ stories they can make up about ford to fill there front pages, its getting beyond a joke.

Crash Test · 8 May 2002, 11:27 (Ref:280180)

People people...

I doubt that there will ever be a "Team Brock" in V8 Supercars, that just wreaks of ********... shall we give them a chance first?

Hasn't Forbes been trying to take a step back in recent times? The Seton-Prodrive thing fell to pieces, but if they still harbour ambitions to get involved, 00 Motorsport would probably be the ideal team. I'm certain Ford wouldn't mind a bit of outside assistance... but I wonder what Prodrive is going to do to revamp the road going Fords?

elephino · 8 May 2002, 11:48 (Ref:280214)

I haven't read the entire story yet, but from what I can tell AA were looking to fill pages so decided to ring Prodrive/Ford and ask if they were looking to get into V8 Supercars. The rest of the story made itself up from there. They weren't going to say they haven't looked into it, as they'd be stupid not to have looked into it. But to go so far as to say they're buying 00MS is a bit over the top, especially when Prodrive probably don't know who they're going to buy, if any team at all.

Mr Squiggle · 8 May 2002, 12:44 (Ref:280267)

I've actually heard this rumour around the pits before. Maybe AA just extrapolated it into a story.

Where there's smoke, there's fire?

racer69 · 8 May 2002, 13:14 (Ref:280296)

Yeah the whole story could've been covered in a couple of sentence's, actually the whole edition seemed like a bit of a space filler

Anyway, even if Prodrive do get involved straight away, it will not be probably until the tailend of next year before we see some real improvement, they wouldn't be the instant force that the article seemed to paint. Prodrive know nothing about V8s, plus look how long it took HRT to become competitive, even with Walkinshaw, Perkins and Percy doing the work in the early years, admitedly with not much of a budget.

On that, how much do we think Walkinshaw or if this Prodrive thing happens David Richards really care what happens if they win or not in V8s, i don't think Walkinshaw has been to an Australian Touring Car race since Bathurst 1988 (apart from AGP), yet in the early 90s he always complained about the rules from England.

M Power · 8 May 2002, 13:17 (Ref:280299)

If 00 Motorsport gets the Ford (HRT) main team tag It would be the BIGGEST mistake Ford could make . Clearly there best hope is with SBR and Marcos not that hake lowndes. But then again if you could see this Happening you would have to blind clowndes has had Ford backing all the time
I feel sorry for Glenn & more Sorry for Ford yet again another Dumb move. Well more HRT wins then.

Buckshot · 8 May 2002, 22:15 (Ref:280602)

Seton didn't peform so Ford/Tickford have given him the Big A - and so they should.

I reckon in a couple of years time you'll see Ambrose and Lowndes together in a PRODRIVE factory team.

How long the current Ambrose contract with SBR ?

Crash Test · 8 May 2002, 23:41 (Ref:280639)

Ambrose has a 5 year contract with Ford, and I think a couple years with SBR.

Just been watching the 2001 season review, and really, Seton was up there mixing it with them for most of the time. Seems as though them 'concentrating' on one car is the dud move... but I guess you get that when nobody will give you any money.

Walkinshaw's been down here a fair few times from memory, but I can't recall anything within the last year or two. Remember, Dave Richards was down here last year. The only conclusion I can see TWR/Prodrive wanting to get their hands dirty in V8s is that there must be a $$ in it for them. Yes, TWR has their HSV, and Prodrive with Tickford, but I doubt that they would want a Supercar team for the sake of having one...

Mr Squiggle · 9 May 2002, 01:30 (Ref:280668)

I would have thought they are really investing in the brand equity of Tickford.

If I was Dave Richards I wouldn't want to be relying on the current Ford teams to market my whiz bang upmarket Falcons.

RaceTime · 9 May 2002, 09:48 (Ref:280812)

Why not? He has to start somewhere and, if he does it right, he takes over a current team (at least some expertise there) and a current driver. Again, if done right, and the driver doesn't perform, new owner 'Oh, did your contract say you couldn't be sacked? Talk to the people that you signed your contract with - goodbye - next!'

Amaroo Park · 9 May 2002, 09:50 (Ref:280816)

Quote:

Originally posted by RaceTime
Why not? He has to start somewhere and, if he does it right, he takes over a current team (at least some expertise there) and a current driver. Again, if done right, and the driver doesn't perform, new owner 'Oh, did your contract say you couldn't be sacked? Talk to the people that you signed your contract with - goodbye - next!'

Just ask Malcom Oastler

RaceTime · 9 May 2002, 10:06 (Ref:280821)

I can't - they refuse to page him in the Unemployment Centre..

D.R.T. · 9 May 2002, 13:05 (Ref:280929)

I agree that Fords best hope apart from getting more "control" parts for the machines in the series is with Marcus ambrose. He is the best driver out there and personally I think its a little tragic he's ended up racing back in oz, however he seems to be really enjoying it.

Crash Test · 10 May 2002, 00:22 (Ref:281398)

"I agree that Fords best hope apart from getting more "control" parts for the machines in the series..."
- The thing is that most of the stardardising of parts will be on the Holden's, getting bits and pieces off the Fords. Everyone in control seems to think this is the way to go, but will this lead to a gain/loss in speed??

elephino · 10 May 2002, 11:10 (Ref:281763)

Depends on who you ask.

If you ask the Holden fans, all those Ford bits will slow the Holdens.
If you ask the Ford fans, they will say it will speed up the Holdens.

Crash Test · 10 May 2002, 11:34 (Ref:281788)

I used to be a Ford fan, so I still don't like Holden, but I have no attachment to Ford. What does this mean?

RaceTime · 10 May 2002, 11:37 (Ref:281794)

That you tow line broke?

Amaroo Park · 2 Jun 2002, 04:06 (Ref:302643)

On RPM this afternoon David Richards said that Prodrive was in Final discussions with 2 V8 Ford teams with a veiw to either take over or buy a share in the team. He went on to say that he expected a decession in a matter of weeks

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