This has just come through from f1-live.com - apparently the Phoenix consortium (who bought some of the assets of the Prost team) have turned up in Malaysia with two Prost AP04s.
So - the plot thickens. This weekend could be very interesting...
The nice thing is if they compete and are successful, one of the personnel can put the "rose out of the ashes like the pheonix" line out and plug the consortium at the same time.
It's not about this year, it's about next year - much easier (and cheaper) to come in on an existing team rather than with a new entry.
I can't see how they have a valid entry - even the French liquidator indicated they'd only bought some gear, not the company that the name of the entry was in, nor the company itself.
Still, if they front, it's one for the lawyers - it won't affect the racing, since with the cars and engines there's no chance of them making the 107% cut off in qualifying.
New team's chances of racing in the Malaysian GP look highly unlikely.
The new Phoenix team's bid to race in this weekend's Malaysian Grand Prix looks to have been scuppered already by motorsport's governing body.
A statement has been released by the FIA which says that Phoenix, who have bought cars and equipment from bankrupt French outfit Prost Grand Prix, have no entry to the 2002 Formula 1 World Championship.
Phoenix, owned by British businessman Charles Nickerson, has turned up in Malaysia with a pair of year-old Prost AP04s. They are said to be fitted with TWR V10 engines used by Arrows in 1999. TWR boss Tom Walkinshaw has also supplied a skeleton crew of mechanics to run the cars.
But the FIA appears to have quashed the chances of Phoenix racing this weekend, even before the cars have made it to scrutineering.
The statement read: "Having examined the judgement of the Tribunal de Commerce de Versailles the FIA's advisers have noted that the court has not transferred Prost Grand Prix itself nor made any attempt to transfer the Prost Grand Prix entry in the 2002 Formula 1 World Championship, either to Phoenix Finance Ltd, or to Mr Nickerson."
If Phoenix wish to enter the 2003 championship, they will have to pay $48 million. It is believed that all they have paid so far is around $2 million for the Prost assets. F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone said last week that all Phoenix had bought was some "show cars".
It seems so were the scrutineers, but since Malaysian customs were quite entertained by a pair of AP04s (with or without gearboxes), they decided to hang on to them for a while.
No scrutineering = no racing, so they'll not be out this weekend.
