There's a reason why they're all in black and white. As the economic downturn slowly strangle the necks of automakers, advertisers alike, the immediate effect is apparent. We all know racing is not just about pure 'Sporting Spirit'. It involves tremendous costs, R&D, personnel, materials, thus sponsorships are equally important, and of course budgets from automakers set aside to enjoy the age old analogy of 'Win on Sunday, Sell on Monday' from Henry Ford himself.
Thus this year, we have the confirmation of Honda exiting F1 (Not exactly huge losses to fans, given F1's actually full of bullshit. Yes, fromBernie Ecclestone, and the Nazi fetish lover Max Mosley). Honda has been trying very hard to make a foothold in F1, with their 2007 campaign, which features NO SPONSORS, and with a huge Blue Planet on its car, its the worst livery ever to be seen on an F1, and racing, burning fuel like nobody's business, and ranked well below some independent teams weren't actually good PR for them, and the Earth thing on a screaming F1 car going 300km/h is just pure bullshit as a Green Message.
This is great loss for WRC, with Mitsubishi gone from the WRC scene, the age old rivals of Blue vs Red, STi vs Evo thou was no longer a scene on WRC, the notion of WRC is almost synonymous with a blue car storming past corners, and so to speak, Subaru is WRC. The rumors of Subaru going away from WRC is painful, as they've always been a favourite, and fan bases, merchandises are huge. Without Subaru, WRC is pointless. Perhaps Mitsubishi could come back, but given that they themselves are equally in a not-so-healthy financial turmoil, that's not something we would put our bets on for time being.
Next up, barely a year into WRC, Suzuki is confirmed to be calling off their 2009 WRC participation, thou the SX4 (or Fiat Sedici) featured in WRC was a relatively unattractive car, Suzuki was actually quite a well established player, most notably their 90s Suzuki Vitara Pikes Peak (not exactly WRC), that had long wired the effect into our brains that Suzuki is not some lame small car manufacturer, not knowing a thing or two in high performance racing.
This is sad news for ALMS, Audi removing themselves from the American Le Mans Series is as if Ferrari not going into F1. The unbeatable champions in ALMS (or any other Le Man race), had decided to not participate in ALMS earlier on, and will only focus on the Le Man race in Europe, stating the uncertainty on economic woes as the primary concern. Leaving their racing fans cold and dry for the nxt season. One thought here, Audi is aiming to be the largest luxury car manufacturer by 2015, and by recent form, they're growing double digit every year, (except 2008 perhaps), market share around the world is gaining momentum in a good pace, as for United States, the largest car market in the world, Audi's presence is minimal compared to Lexus, BMW and Mercedes Benz, however its outpacing others in terms of growth, thus is it sensible for Audi to pull off from ALMS
Next up, Porsche has always been trying to win over Audi in ALMS, and with the withdrawal, Porsche would have a good chance, but perhaps they wanted Audi to be there for a good 'fight', and they've announced their removal from ALMS. This move with Audi and Porsche gone from ALMS will be devastating to this racing event, perhaps forever as the withdrawals will not only impact the viewership, sponsorship and the mere 'desirability' of the entire event, it'll be very difficult for the organizers to again attract big manufacturers to participate for upcoming years. Yes, I can foresee the dying of ALMS already.
