'Aki'lles

In the current 'gloom and doom' economic climate it is certainly not hard to predict the fact that revenue flowing in from sponsorship and advertising deals into sports and sporting events would reduce to a trickle. Sports, it appears, would inadvertently be a casualty of the recession (or should I be using the term depression?). However, the problems that could plague Formula One in a prolonged recession certainly set it apart from the fortunes of other global sports.

Recently Honda decided to pull out of F1, to concentrate on its 'core business' i.e. that of manufacturing cars. Speculation now surrounds the possibility of Toyota biding goodbye to F1. A recent article which appeared in the Financial Times draws attention to the fact that after Honda, Toyota has spent more than any other car manufacturer on F1, close to £700 million over the past five years. In difficult economic times, when cutting costs is the norm and with company results scrutinised thoroughly by analysts and shareholders alike, it would appear logical to do away with the glamour of racing for a while.

The survival of teams with billionaires at their helm is being called into question too. Billionaires have seen huge amounts of their fortunes being wiped off in the bearish market and if their other businesses(Airlines for instance in Vijay Mallya's case) take a pounding or two in the recession, then continuing in F1 would be the last thing on their mind.

The aforementioned article in FT is centered primarily on the payment behaviour of the teams in F1. Astonishingly only 2 of the 10 teams pay their invoices by the due date and teams such as Force India pay 99% of its invoices nearly 75 days late! Throwing in the current economic factors into this equation as a well, its not hard to guess that the delays in payment are surely going to worsen and would call into question the credit worthiness of most teams. All in all, it certainly seems to be tough times ahead for F1.