Also if the Prost team is revived then Minardi will not get the revenues that were diverted from the Prost team to Minardi when Prost went under. I beleive that if Minardi bought Prost then they would of recieved the revenues but would not have had to field the Prost team. They would also have been able to purchase some very cheap in F1 terms equipment.

[Edited by sillysi - 3/1/2002 10:11:33 AM]

Quote "Britain is set to have another Formula One team by the next race in Malaysia in a shock move that has sparked a furious row between two rival bosses.
The Prost team which was declared bankrupt by a French court at the end of January was bought for £1.86m late on Thursday by a mystery investor, understood to be a consortium of European companies.
Arrows boss Tom Walkinshaw has denied he is the buyer but has confirmed that his TWR group (Tom Walkinshaw Racing) will supply the technical support to get the team, which will move to an as yet unknown site in England.
But Minardi boss Paul Stoddart, who lost out in the bid for Prost, claimed Walkinshaw was the buyer and has vowed to take the matter to the courts insisting it is against the Concorde Agreement which governs the sport.
"It's Tom Walkinshaw - maybe under another company name," claimed Stoddart, who stands to lose millions of pounds in television money and travel subsidies he would have inherited from Prost if the French team is revived, said in Melbourne today.
"I think what he has done is outside of the Concorde Agreement. I have a financial interest in this and Minardi will become a loser if this travesty of justice is allowed to continue.
"But this is wrong for Formula One. I will be taking him to court before we get to Malaysia seeking an injunction to stop this thing from happening.
"It's time the team principals united to stop stupidity like this. This is not Paul Stoddart with sour grapes, this is someone who cares passionately that we do not tear F1 apart."
But Walkinshaw, who employs over 2500 engineers worldwide, immediately hit-back insisting all his Leafield- based company was doing was providing technical expertise.
"TWR are supporting a group of people who have bought the assets to Prost," said the Scotsman, who believes the team could be on the grid in Kuala Lumpur in a fortnight.
"We will help them on the engineering side to get them up-and-running quickly as the season has already started.
"They want to make this happen as quickly as possible. I would think by the race in Brazil, maybe in Malaysia.
"I'd like to know why Paul Stoddart made these comments. There were two bidders and he did not bid enough, its as simple as that. He's disappointed."
Argentinian Gaston Mazzacane and Tomas Enge are favourites to drive for the new team which will keep the Prost name for this year at least while former boss Alain Prost, the four-time former world champion, will have no interest in the outfit.
Mazzacane was ditched by Prost after just four races last year while Enge became the first Czech driver to compete in F1 when he raced in the final three races of the season for the team."

Ok all very interresting, but what I dont understand is.....
If Tom Walkinshaw is the mystery buyer (and he claims he isn't!) why is this such a problem for Paul Stobbard? Surely what he intended to do is just the same?

The problem is that Paul Stoddart bid $30m for Prost before they were liquidated. What the consortium backed by Tom Walkinshaw have done is wait until it's been liquidated, so the people owed money don't get paid anything, and then picked up the infrastructure for a song (about $2m). Stoddart's not happy, obviously!

The return of Gaston Marzipan?!?! Nooo... :eek::eek::eek: Enge's signed up full time for an F3000 team, so why not Jos Verstappen and Justin Wilson for example? Though they'll probably need a pay driver... perhaps Pedro Diniz or someone?!

This will take a while to settle down :).

Richard

Stoddart also put in a bid yesterday, which he claims was to spoil Walkinshaw's (the implication is that if he'd won it, he wouldn't have fielded the team). I think he has a good point that the teams effectively value their place on the grid as £25-30 million's worth, but Walkinshaw has picked up the 12th slot for only £1.6 million. OTOH if Stoddart had bought the team, they're hardly going to ignore the technical expertise that the team had (though I understand the Prost aero wasn't up to much).

They may both occupy the arse end of the grid, but both Walkinshaw and Stoddart run very successful businesses are are canny blokes, so I can see there being some friction.

The way I see it is that Stoddart is pretty pissed that it went for £2m (or however much) considering he must have bid higher than that for it in his spoiling bid. If my team was to pick up £12m (or whatever) TV money on the back of Prost not starting this season then I'd try and buy the team to put to bed, and bid considerably more than £2m....

Justin

Latest is that VW ( via Skoda ) have bought the team , will use the Ap04 Prost chassis and engines supplied by TWR. No-one is confirming or denying, but its very interesting bearing in mind the car manufacterurs plans for the "premier grand prix" series in a couple of years....