Rahal leaves Jaguar

[JeremySmith]

Rahal Ousted in Jaguar Racing Coup
Bobby Rahal has been relieved of his duties as CEO at Jaguar Racing in the wake of a rift between himself and Niki Lauda. London, England, Aug. 23 ? It will be confirmed on Friday that Bobby Rahal has been ousted from his position as chief executive officer of Jaguar Racing less than a year after taking on one of the most challenging roles in F1.

His resignation comes after a lengthy meeting this afternoon with Wolfgang Reitzle, president of Ford's Premier Automotive Group, which includes the Jaguar brand. The two-time CART champion and Indy 500 winner has lost out in a political battle with retired three-time World Champion Niki Lauda, with whom he shared the running of the team in a complex operational structure.

Ironically, Rahal almost pulled off the coup of his career when he secured a contract with McLaren technical director Adrian Newey, who then changed his mind and decided to stay with his current employers. Had Newey joined Jaguar as agreed, Rahal's position would have been safe for as long as he wanted to stay, as the designer's contract reputedly contained a clause allowing him to leave Jaguar should Rahal do so for any reason.

It promises to be an expensive exercise for Jaguar, which faces the prospect of paying around $5.8m in severance in order to terminate the balance of Rahal's three-year contract, which had been intended to last through until October 2003.

The management of the team was complicated at the start of the year when Lauda was appointed as chairman of Ford?s Premier Performance Division, which includes Jaguar Racing, Cosworth Engines and Pi Engineering, answerable to Reitzle. Increasingly irreconcilable differences in management style between Lauda and Rahal came to a head after last month's German Grand Prix, when Rahal allegedly tried to sell Eddie Irvine's contract to the rival Jordan/Honda team.

[regf1]

The website: www.grandprix.com is reporting this story as well...

[EERO]

This rumour is currently unconfirmed on any of the major sites.

[JeremySmith]

I am sorry I thought I left the name of the website that I pasted this info from..I just removed the HTML for pics..I thought!

[eatapc]

Atlas F1 is reporting it also, and it has been rumored for days. Apparently the embarrassment from the Newey fiasco was the genesis of Rahal's trouble. Lauda ran his airline into the ground; I guess Ford's Wolfgang Reitzle figures that high-tech machines on the ground are Lauda's forte.

[Bononi]

So truth or not ????

[JeremySmith]

I got this article from Speedvision.Com
I think it's true from all accounts..bad news



AUGUST 23, 2001
Rahal ousted in head-to-head with Lauda
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Bobby Rahal, European GP 2001 © The Cahier Archive
NIKI LAUDA has won his battle for control of the Jaguar F1 team as it will be announced on Friday that Bobby Rahal has been ousted from his position as its chief executive officer after less than a year in the post.

Rahal's resignation comes after a lengthy meeting yesterday afternoon with Wolfgang Reitzle, president of Ford's Premier Automotive Group which controls Jaguar, Aston Martin, Volvo, Land Rover and Lincoln. Rahal has lost out in a political battle with retired triple world champion Lauda with whom he shared the running of the team in a characteristically complex operational structure put in place Ford, the owners of Jaguar.

Ironically Rahal almost pulled off the coup of his career when he secured a contract with McLaren technical director Adrian Newey who then changed his mind and decided to stay with his current employers.

It promises to be an expensive exercise for Jaguar who face the prospect of paying around four million pounds in severance in order to terminate the balance of Rahal's three year contract.

The management of the team was complicated when Lauda was appointed as chairman of the premier automotive group, answerable to Reitzle, at the start of this year. Increasingly irreconcilable differences in management style between Lauda and Rahal came to a head after last month's German GP when Rahal allegedly tried to sell Eddie Irvine's contract to the rival Jordan-Honda team.

Lauda was outraged and vetoed the project, but sources close to the team believe that the differences between the two men ran deeper and this was the issue which brought matters to a head. Rahal clearly believed his contract gave him a wide brief to make key engineering appointments and then stand back, giving his team space to show what they could do.

By contrast Lauda made little secret of his view that the American was lacking management skills when it came to motivating the 250-strong workforce at the team's Milton Keynes headquarters.


And here it is from Grandprix.com

[Ray Bell]

Four million quid severance pay?

That should be a help to him as he gets used to not having jetlag!

Wonder if it will alter his engine supply situation in CART?

[AndyF]

FOUR MILLION POUNDS - Unbeliveable. They won't be able to buy a replacement now!!

[Ray Bell]

Do they need another argument that badly?

Don't worry, they're still spending money Henry made with the T-model...

[Stephen Green]

The story has been confirmed on Reuters this morning.

[Joe Fan]

Bad decision Wolfgang! Niki is a smooth talker but doesn't have a track record of managing anything successfully.

Niki was the one who engineered the Cosworth engine deal for Arrows next year because he felt that competition would be a good thing. I bet he wishes that he didn't pull the trigger on that deal now. He will have to be the one to take the heat if Arrows outperforms Jaguar. Wouldn't it be interesting if Bobby turned up at Arrows next year?

[Minardi fan]

Are we surprised about this?









































No. Not one tiny bit.

[downforce]

Jaguar is a WEIRD team.

Time to ditch Irvine and PDLR(tho i like him)...too!!
Time to give Narain a fair test. In 15 laps he was 1 second outside PDLR @ Silverstone.

WEIRD ass****!

Paint a car red and it GOes!
Paint a car green and it STOPs!

WEIRD. Green car should jus give up those gold-dust mags to the champs, THEY need'em badly!

[JeremySmith]

IMHO Jaguar is one team that could not organize a Pee up in a brewery..Big mistake firing Bobby Rahal..Formula1 need's an American presence to win over the huge audience here in the states...Mr Rahal would have been that man..So now we are left with Lauda and Irvine complete farce,I am sure Henry is turning in his grave...

[AdrianG]

Why does Jaguar keep doing this?

It's no wonder they struggle, making changes to key personel all the time rather than letting everything settle in to a nice setup like it was as the Stewart team.

[f1manoz]

It appears Rahal is the fall guy for another startling season of under-performance from the Jaguar team.

Now Lauda has ALL the power!!!!

*evil laugh in the background*

[MichaelC]

Personally I think Lauda should have gone too. When he was a consultant to Ferarri, they were absolute rubbish. As soon as he left, their form picked up and look where they are now!

[Bononi]

Very bad move for Jaguar. I guess its becoming a standard for them.

[EERO]

Okay, now its confirmed and I think its a hugely bad move.

What Jaguar needs is consistency. The alleged sale of Irvine to Jordan is just an excuse. As much as I admire Lauda, he's a control freak and the team will suffer.

Jeremy, you are correct aboput an American presence; I had a lot of hope for the team because I admire Rahal. I won't be supporting them now.

[Maxmil]

Originally posted by EERO
Okay, now its confirmed and I think its a hugely bad move.

Bad? Yes, but the status quo was impossible. Inevitable? Probably

This is just a typical GFMC management foul up which they seem to have true proclivity for creating. (Maybe it's the ghost of Henry I or Henry II for that matter.)

The big mistake was to bring in Lauda over Bobby's head. Both are racers, both have graduated to management positions, and both are known to be strong willed. It was inevitable from day one that Lauda would not leave Bobby alone to run the team, and that Bobby would not tolerate his interference. His buyout is well deserved, and should teach Ford a lesson, but it won't. Meanwhile, on with the dance!

[BBKing]

I don’t know how Rahal survived the Newey fiasco but it left him completely to the mercy of Lauda.

This must be a unique rat that sticks around when the ship is sinking…LOL

I give Jaguar one more year to erase themselves from F1. Lauda might have been a great driver but he is not a good manager. Like Rahal said upon closing the door behind him:”I come here to work, not to socialize with Eddie Irvine. I am in Milton Keynes and not in the Monaco Harbour”

Bad move. They went for the wrong head. Irvine and Lauda should have been dropped instead of Rahal.

[botsquad]

im choking up..i really am.

will someone please hand me tissue.

[eatapc]

Farklempt, are you? Grab a tissue; the rest of us will talk amongst ourselves. Topic: Should Wolfgang Reitzle take the Premier Automotive Group F1 team away from Jaguar and rename it "Volvo" next year?

[EERO]

I have strong suspicions that Rahal was brought in by Ford because they thought he would help them to land Newey,; when that deal went South, Bobby's head went on the block.

I lkie and admire Lauda, but he is a an unproven quantity as a team principle. Rahal could have made it work, he was the one chance Ford had to overcome the Machiavellian machinations of the first Jaguar season-oops, Ford, too late!