USF1 -- F1's All-American Challenger

[WhiteBlue]

Xpensive, you better stop making personal attacks on other users. As you know that's not tolerated.

[xpensive]

Xpensive, you better stop making personal attacks on other users. As you know that's not tolerated.

Are you a user WB? I had no idea, really.

[Richard]

Exclusive interview with Ken Anderson

Peter has now gone back to England, but he lives there. He has stayed in a hotel here for the last three months.

Oh, the irony after pee-wee's US patriotism and EU bashing

[djos]

I don't know why dealing with some Aussies rubs me the wrong way. Perhaps it is the exceptional courtesy in language that is hard to digest for a country boy from Bavaria. Be advised that I'm not kidding you. I just repeated in short what was claimed by Ken Anderson.

It happens to fit nicely to what I have perceived so far. If you draw other conclusions or have other opinions you are completely entitled to that. I don't see a conflict in Ken Anderson's explanation. The first rumors by Bernie were about financial difficulties (22th December 2009). This obviously induced some nervousness and sponsors may have stepped away. By mid Jan he met the payroll late and could not pay suppliers (for instance Cosworth) which brought things to a grinding halt. That's exactly what I have said. Very tight schedule without reserves and a cash flow crisis which wasn't helped by Bernie's rumors.

WB, Ken's a Yank not an Aussie - PW was raised in Aus tho but born in the UK.

Yeah I bet Bernies rumour mongering didn't help USF1 at all - sometimes I wish he'd STFU!

[Scorpaguy]

"Not at all, the aftermath is the interesting part"

Regarding the upcoming decision to allow USF1 to enter in 2011. I'd give it little chance (even on the FIA saving face argument). Following the "team" closely in both local and national news....it never seemed "real". The entire facade of the team appeared sophmoric. I was hoping this inatttention to thier "image" meant the real energy was going into the nuts and bolts of the car....however, it seems previous few car parts were actually made. Gosh, I hope I'm wrong.

[DaveKillens]

It was back on Feb 4, 2009 when Ken Anderson and Peter Windsor showed up on SpeedTV and announced their grand plans. So it's not that they are one of the teams that had to get in on Max's lottery, or whatever it was.

I'm not a businessman, but it's reasonable to assume the dynamic duo should have some basic business plan in place, and some funding set up in a realistic manner. OK, maybe not enough to compete for a season, more sponsors would be expected to get on board as time went on.

Unfortunately, Anderson and Windsor made a lot of wild and exaggerated statements, and also placed the operations of the company under a veil of secrecy. There was all kind of talk about how far developed the car was, it's innovations, yada yada yada. But in the end, when Charlie Whiting visited the operation on Feb 24, the result one week later the team "was not capable of competing". You can keep the walls up and feed the public BS, but when the FIA came calling to determine exactly what was goin on, they obviously didn't pass inspection.

And then the tides or reality moved in and washed away the sand castle.

Bloody shame, because I really believe a US based Formula One team would have done wonders not only for F1, but open wheel racing in the US. Trust me, under the right leadership the US can produce a worthy team. But USF1 is now on indefinite hold, and sadly, probably won't recover from this massive setback. Now that Formula Atlantic is also going to be away for 2010, open wheel racing in the US is in a worse position than it was one year ago.

[WhiteBlue]

One thing that we can say for sure is that USF1 is out of a 2010 license and that their application for deferrance to 2011 was not granted.

If Hurley still wants an F1 team he needs to get serious with supporting the outfit he selects in the right way. Have a look over at Branson and Virgin. What is the point of sinking 10 or 15 million $ into a team and ending up with nothing?

I'm very curious to see if USF1 will try again in 2011 and if Hurley will be on board again.

[rifrafs2kees]

It's really a sad situation and frankly, it is a direct result of the racing culture here in the US. Motor racing is still in the dark ages here. Can you imagine how difficult it is to find infrastructure, and mental resources to build an f1 car in a place where straight line speed and oval racing is all that racers have cared about?"..what can you do in a quarter mile and that kinda crap?" For goodness sake NASCAR still relies on solid axles and sheetmetal...and that is what we call premier racing here. It reflects on American cars too....they can't turn worth a dime. The Europeans keep forging ahead with new technologies while nostalgia rules here. If USF1 had gotten over the financial hurdles and stayed true to their "American Made" mantra, they'd have stunk worse than Minardi ever did. And I'm sure they would not have gotten sponsorship to run a 3 or more year "extreme backmarking campaign" before they learned the ropes. No well managed company with enough resources would have sponsored a US F1 team when all people seem to care about here is Nascar or some drag race. They were doomed to fail from day 1.

[xpensive]

@ Dave Killens;
I was all the time thinking to myself, are they this smart or that stupid, or, is this a scam or are they just losers?

After reading Renckens interview and also what Stefan Johansson, who worked with KA at Ligier, Onyx and Bettenhausen, had to say, I see another more plausible xplanation. Anderson is a very convincing mythomaniac, why also PW was taken.

Some elements worked in his favour as well, FIAs visitor, Nick Craw, is American, why he saw what he wanted to see.

But you can't fool MrE.

[Fil]

It happens to fit nicely to what I have perceived so far. If you draw other conclusions or have other opinions you are completely entitled to that. I don't see a conflict in Ken Anderson's explanation. The first rumors by Bernie were about financial difficulties (22th December 2009). This obviously induced some nervousness and sponsors may have stepped away. By mid Jan he met the payroll late and could not pay suppliers (for instance Cosworth) which brought things to a grinding halt. That's exactly what I have said. Very tight schedule without reserves and a cash flow crisis which wasn't helped by Bernie's rumors.

No, that's fine, i understand, accept, and agree with your latest changed perception.

But your initial perception when posting his answers was different & included still blaming Concorde delays.

You - "Their official reason for failing is the short time from the Concord agreement.."
Anderson - "..we were on schedule right up until mid-January.."
^^Conflict.

Anderson - "..and that was when some issues arose with sponsors that kind of locked us up"
You - "..a cash flow crisis due to a sponsor withdrawal"
^^Agreement.

Does that make sense?

[marcush.]

I agree but also don´t
I agree on Anderson being a mythomaniac.
But he´s not in a sense of being a complete honk,he has done complete cars ,that actually turned wheels more than once.
And this alone rises him above average by a huge margin.Also his effort in penske shocks ..etc,etc which are not debatable in my view tellme ,the guy is in a ways quite a man .
But his crafts in terms of day to day running a racing business ,being in charge there is not his strength partly perhaps because he is not living it in todays ways

Skunkworks was the buzzword,so the plan is in his head ,not written down and acceable for everyone and plausibility checks should not be performed alone sitting
in your office cheking your own plans.We heard that neither Windsor nor Hurley were on site or even on top of what really was going on .This is simply amateur behaviour from there side .
You will have to constantly have to review what is panned and what is ticked off in your planning and measures to be taken to get back on track is the item on the agenda with highest priority.
To pop in from time to time is not enough for a board member ,you have controlling
responsibility there.
So I blame additionally to Anderson :
Hurley,Windsor,FIA,Ecclestone for not acting correctly from day one.
To go public for Ecclestone was in my view the death call for USF1 and it would have been for Campos if Carabantes aim would not have been to take control of the team (why should he have momey to put in suddenly when the team is for sale ,but not to run the show as intendet being a partner? .That does not make big sense to me ,apart from trying to get complete control)

[nacho]

Wasn't it back in May 2009 already that they said the CAD drawings are finished?

[Pandamasque]

You - "Their official reason for failing is the short time from the Concord agreement.."
Anderson - "..we were on schedule right up until mid-January.."
^^Conflict.

Anderson - "..and that was when some issues arose with sponsors that kind of locked us up"
You - "..a cash flow crisis due to a sponsor withdrawal"
^^Agreement.

Does that make sense?

Are you saying that actually WB is not Principal Ken?

[Richard]

A reminder that there are people who's livelihoods (and families) depended on this...

Biting my lip...wow... 5:53 PM Mar 3rd via web

Its been a horrific month for sure. I Won't give up on F1. Maybe have to take a different route but my determination to contribute remains 5:42 AM Mar 3rd via web

Head coaching Little Eric's basketball team tonight. Trying to get them in the playoffs. 3:03 PM Feb 27th via web

Wish I was in Barcelona testing... 4:25 PM Feb 26th via web

http://twitter.com/ericswarren

[Fil]

Are you saying that actually WB is not Principal Ken?

i would never go that low to claim he was.
WB actually offers something useful in this world. Its great having someone who takes the opposing view to the majority.
Its a lonely world being a blindly loyal fan of the FIA. He does it quite well.