F1 must reflect lean times, says Richards

London, Jan 10: Formula One must do more to strip out costs and reconnect with the ordinary spectator caught in the credit crunch, former team boss David Richards said on Friday."They (the cuts agreed so far) are on the right track, and are all well intentioned, but I don`t think they go far enough," the former Benetton and BAR principal told Reuters in a telephone interview from the Autosport International Show in Birmingham. "I don`t want to get drawn into individual things... but what you have got to do is gauge public sentiment and gauge how people are viewing things now," added Richards, who is also chairman of luxury British-based sportscar maker Aston Martin. "People are not buying expensive cars today. They are not buying anything quite frankly, but they are not buying anything that is perceived as extravagant, excessive, overtly luxurious or blatantly ostentatious." "The ultimate expression of that over the last few years has been Formula One," added Richards, whose engineering company Prodrive in 2007 shelved plans to enter Formula One after securing a slot. "So if people are not behaving that way, they are not going to relate and align themselves with a sport that doesn`t address those very same issues that each one of us as individuals has had to address." "Engaging with the fans and keeping the fans onside at a time when everybody is going through enormous pressures in their own personal circumstances is an important aspect of it," said Richards. Prodrive, 40 percent owned by Kuwait`s The Investment DAR company, also ran the Subaru world rally team until the manufacturer announced last month that they were withdrawing from the series. Formula One teams and the governing International Automobile Federation (FIA) have announced a package of measures, including a ban on testing during the season and affordable engines for independent teams, to slash outgoings from this season. Further savings are also in the pipeline, and could include budget caps. "It is going through that process," Richards said when asked whether the sport needed to take a reality check following Honda`s decision last month to withdraw due to the financial situation. "I think that is slowly coming to bear." "But it is very difficult for those involved directly to perhaps be objective enough. Things have to happen very quickly and probably far deeper than everyone originally anticipated." Richards made clear that he was not about to ride to the rescue of Honda`s team in the current circumstances, although he could not rule it out absolutely. "I still think its an excellent team, it`s got all the right facilities, but its got a massive overhead at the moment and it`s got to go through a transition to get into an appropriate cost level for the future economics of Formula One," he said. "But who knows what`s happening next week. who knows what someone might ask me to become involved in next week or the week after? I`ve seen how things change very quickly in this business." "In the environment we are in at the moment, nothing is a certainty." Honda Racing chief executive Nick Fry said on Thursday that around 12 serious buyers of the team were under consideration but gave no details. Bureau Report