Toyota Motorsport end HRT support

2010 F1 season

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Christian Klien, HRT, Abu Dhabi, 2010

Toyota Motorsport say they are no longer offering support to HRT.

A statement issued by the company said:

Toyota Motorsport GmbH (TMG) confirms that all cooperation with Hispania Racing F1 Team (HRT) has been terminated and will not resume.

TMG retains all intellectual property rights to its current F1 car and is completely free to pursue other projects and support new customers for its high-performance engineering services.

TMG regrets that HRT has not met its contractual payment obligations and will pursue all available options to reach a satisfactory conclusion to this matter.

Toyota Motorsport has acted as an engineering services supplier since its Cologne-based team withdrew from Formula 1 at the end of last year. Its facilities includ a wind tunnel and driving simulator.

HRT’s 2010 car, the F110, was designed by Dallara, who the team split from in May of this year.

Update: HRT have released a short statement saying only: “Hispania Racing is very surprised about Toyota’s Press Statement released this afternoon and?óÔé¼?¢ this matter will be a subject of further clarification.”

Image © Motioncompany

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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46 comments on “Toyota Motorsport end HRT support”

  1. I wonder where this will leave them with a car next year, having apparently systematically ****** off anyone who could supply a chassis

    1. They have no money…no major sponsors…and their 2011 car is going to be even slower than this year if they are this late in thinking about it…they should sell their entry to a team that is keen on actually racing

      1. so maybe it was premature by FIA to deny access to Jacques Villeneuve

        1. Wasn’t Jacques’s bid a deal with Durango? They weren’t that great with running cars or sorting out their finances.

  2. HRT has an awful record for meeting its payments for its cars.

    Looks like they are in deep trouble over the winter.

  3. Reminds me of the boat Spyker/Force India were in through there formative years.

    Mike Gasgoyne
    “Hi Mr Sponsor, you know that fuel rig Christian ripped off by driving out of the pits with it still attached?, could you pay for that?”
    Mr Sponsor
    “ermm, no.”

    1. Wasn’t that managed by the same Kolles at the time? Even the driver chairdance is similar.

      That said, I suspect they lured enough people away from TMG to enable Geoff Wills to design a reasonable car with the Williams rear end.

  4. im quessing by the end of 2011 hrt will be in lots of debt from not being able to meet payments

  5. I wonder how HRT will develop their 2011 car now, considering they already looked set to be the worst team for next year. However I still thought they might improve seeing as they recently signed a new sponsor and got Klien in the car instead of Yamamoto who doesn’t deserve to be in F1.

    1. The first thing any team needs is money.
      If HRT really are in trouble, then I doubt sacrificing Sakon’s money would actually help, at all.
      On the other hand, I suspect that it’s got more to do with either a) Sakon’s money running out, or b) HRT being in a better financial state than you might expect.

  6. Have we heard anything about their plans for next year? I can’t recall any. I won’t be surprised if they disappear over the winter.

    1. They are buying Williams drivetrain and gearboxs, and Williams aren’t slouches with their gearbox’s.

      The problem is HRT can muster up a bit of cash for a gearbox I’m sure, but they don’t have a manufacturing plant, so cutting off ties with Dallara was pretty silly.

      1. Oops my bad :) Completely forgot about that. Lets hope they pay Williams at least.

        I am gutted that Virgin finished last in the championship – they at least look like a F1 team. I don’t get the point of HRT to be honest – none of their own developments, pay drivers and almost no sponsors.

      2. Hope it’ll be enough for them to beat Virgin again, but I don’t think so.

  7. How much support had Toyota offered them to begin with? And how much did they supply before the deal was aborted? Because it’s sounding to me as if this was over before it began.

  8. What a mess HRT is. I honestly don’t see them making the grid next year unless something magical happens.

    1. What a mess Colin Kolles is. I honestly don’t see them making the grid next year unless something magical happens.

      Fixed.

      1. I don’t agree, He’s got them through 2010. Which in itself is a minor miracle.
        I think he is doing a very good job. Peter window and the other guy from USF1 where thought of far more highly, and look where they ended up!

  9. I suspect the deal was for Toyota to design and maybe even build the 2011 car. The part of the statement that reads that they retain intellectual property makes me suspect they may want to try and sell whatever data / designs they worked on to another team.

    1. I’m just sad Toyota didn’t race their 2010 car, it was a great design and I think it would have been at the sharp end of the field and made the championship even closer.

      Curse you Toyota, you leave just when you’ve figured out how to build a good car, your road cars are boring as hell and your quality has gone to crap.

      1. you mean the exact same thing honda did with the brawn bgp001…….

        1. Yep. It could’ve been another Brawn if someone could’ve gotten their hands on it. Kind of makes me wish StefanGP had been allowed to race, as chaotic as that would’ve been.

  10. Surely there’s no time to design a car from this point on – unless Geoff Willis has a car already drafted as a back up, it’s either a case of buying in a design (Of which only Toyota would be a competitive option), or adapting this years car.

    Where is the line drawn on customer cars these days? Could a competitive, but lower budget team (Williams, Force India) sell off an old design for HRT to adapt?

    1. Definitely a possibility if its within the rules, we know they already have a bit of a deal with williams after all

      1. I don’t think they could, customer cars were finally got rid of this year with Toro Rosso having to actually come up with their own design. They and Honda/Super Aguri were getting away with it for a while, but I think now they’ve put a stop to it.

  11. scrub what I said, it seems what they were buying in was the 2010 car to use as a platform to develop from.

  12. Bruno Senna please get out of HRT!!!

    1. well, he didn’t prove this year that he deserved a better car.

  13. last news Ive heard is De la Rosa driving for HRT and providing 6 Mio € to the team thru former Telefonica president Villalonga who would become team co-owner. Maybe Telefonica sponsorshiping???

    http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSLDE6A503N20101106

    1. Villalonga isn’t affiliated with Telefonicia anymore. They were rumoured to be Hispania’s title sponsor very early on last season when they were still known as Campos Grand Prix – the team was reported to be signing Pedro de la Rosa, who was bringing Telefonicia sponsorship. But de la Rosa decided he wanted to wait it out and see if there were other seats going. That was arguably the beginning of the end for Campos, because they had been counting on de la Rosa/Telefonicia for a while.

      1. News from November the 6th. We’ll see..

    2. But who in their right mind would want to be associated with Hispania? I certainly wouldn’t want to have my name plastered on the joke of motor racing.

      I’m pretty sure the only area Hispania can succeed is in sullying the good name of Spanish motorsport.

      1. You have to look at the marketing opportunities really. F1 is huge and getting some global coverage through products \ TV etc is massive.
        HRT will be one of the cheaper teams to sponsor and you could probably swing a good deal on corporate days out etc to entertain clients.
        As long as they ditch the grey colour I don’t mind. I found it so dreary. It almost slowed the car down itself being so dull.

  14. bets on the team not making it Barhain next year?

    Unless they find financial support (most of which would come from spain because I don’t see why a major brand would invest in such a team), they’ll fade… That said, with the currect politic and economic situation in Spain, things look a lot darker.

    1. Spain already have an F1 darling to get behind (and he drives a red car)

  15. Haplessness Realised by Toyota! ;)

  16. Holy Mother!

    HRT? Not paying bills!

    In a topsy turvy unpredictable season, this has to take the crown. Who would have thought that the team who didn’t make any pre-season tests because they hadn’t paid Dallara, started the seasons with next to no sponsors and picked up…. none… during the year, failed to make a single update to the car all year, had to be bought out and renamed a few weeks before the season began, with their founder booted out in favour of a guy who’d run a couple of other backmarker teams into the ground, who ended up playing musical chairs with their drivers from day to day based on the amount of loose change dug out from the back of the sofa, would get dropped, dropped? by a technical partner just because of a short term financing issue?

    They should get those guys on the F1 Forum.

    Wait, I’ve just seen the first draft of the HRT press release:

    Hispania Racing is very surprised about Toyota’s Press Statement released this afternoon and‎ this matter will be a subject of further clarification, because we haven’t paid a minibar bill all year, and we can’t imagine why Toyota thought they’d get their bills paid before Bernie called in his debts. On the other hand this is a team that after 8 solid years of dismal failure stood around 12 months ago with a straight face claiming they were having serious discussions with Raikkonen. And people call us hopeless.”

  17. I’m not exactly sure which one of the previous two comments is better :D

  18. I can see HRT turning up next season with nothing more than a slight rehash of this year’s car. Given that Toyota are the only people known to have a fully developed but currently unused F1 car lying about, what other options do HRT have left?

  19. Maybe Richards buy HRT name? & rebrand Toyota car/engine ?? Certainly more potential & in three years possibly a major team! Jaques V is kidding himself as to his own potential anyway years ago with all BAT money he could not make it!!

  20. Before they’er ridiculed off the planet……. remember HRT finished ahead of Virgin in the standings

    1. Mostly thanks to Chandhok, who they booted out mid-season!

  21. This is very bad for HRT. How on Earth will they draw any sponsors now? Beating Virgin in the constructor standings is wasted if their business reputation discourages investors from taking a risk.

  22. Kolles seems to be the most incompetent person in F1. And an idiot as well.

    1. I suppose you’ve never heard of Ken Anderson and Peter Windsor?

  23. To be honest, I like them. They have no money, no car, and we have no idea whether they will survive.
    They remind me of Minardi.

    Actually, seriously I think you guys are being way to critical. I’d like to see you take over a Campos like business and make it work. Kolles I think has done a great job to keep them going thus far. The team shouldn’t have survived after the Campos effort fell over. But it did.

    ….. Bernie has said that the new teams give nothing back to F1. But I disagree entirely. Having new teams, even if they are struggling, is a must for the credibility of the spot. What’s the point of motor racing if your only racing against the guys Mr Bernie has a soft spot for?

    This year, Alonso was paid more as an individual, than HRT spent on their whole team.
    You know. HRT finished quite a few races. I doubt Alonso alone could match their pace.
    Even! if we give him a push bike.

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