I'm really confused as to why Ford is pulling out as a Works team. Next year will finally give them a chance for a champioship title, so why are they giving it up? M-Sport will still run, so we'll still see some Fiestas out on the gravel. But it's just really baffled me as to why they're giving up a chance for something they've wanted for so long.
No Loeb, no more publicity..ironically. Other than Ogier and maybe a couple of other drivers...is there any real excitement?
To be honest, I'm surprised Ford have stayed in so long without any championship title. Am I right in thinking they almost pulled out a few years ago? (I think before the new turbos came in?).
Presumably they want to focus on WTCC (which I don't understand either as its also a bit of a dying-a-slow-death series).
Personally I think more and more these days that race series should try to push some kind of rules preventing full blown factory efforts and focus on making things cheaper for the independents. Or at least prevent the kind of domination we see with Citroen (WRC) and Chevrolet (WTCC) - full blown factory efforts might be generally more attractive to manufacturers...but not when it becomes expensive and almost futile to beat the best. The balance needs to be shifted back to smaller teams...so that manufacturers can be enticed into backing an existing team..rather than having to set up their own operation each time.
Not to mention the WRC especially would be much more exciting if the smaller outfits actually stood any kind of chance. There is pretty much no chance at the title for them currently. There only has to be 1 factory team present and they're screwed.
Although there were other factors involved too, but look at the Prodrive - BMW partnership. One wonders if BMW would have maintained a factory MINI team if things were a bit cheaper...as that car clearly can fight for the title given the proper budget and development time. Its examples like that put manufacturers off, they have to invest so much just to even have a chance against Citroen.
I still blame the drivers a bit too for being too inconsistent at Ford. That really can't help - though its always going to be an on-going debate whether the problem was the car being too slow that they had to drive over the edge or if it really was the drivers making too many mistakes.
