Following the sale of Spyker F1 (again), the new owners have announced the team's new name: Force India. Indian investor Vijay Mallya got together with former Spyker Cars CEO Michiel Mol to buy the team from the financially-troubled niche sportscar manufacturer, which it now seems had no business in F1 to begin with. Spyker itself had acquired the team from Midland, who in turn had purchased it from Jordan, changing the name and image with each new owner.
Mallya aims to use his new team to raise India's image abroad in an apparent confusion between Formula One and the A1GP World Cup of Motorsport, which is made up of national teams. The team's logo is anticipated to include the Indian flag, and will probably look like the one on Mallya's hat (at right).
[Source: Formula One]
It has been speculated that Mallya would employ two Indian drivers. Former Jordan race driver and current Williams tester Narain Karthikeyan, who has also raced for Team India in A1, could well come back to the race seat under the new team. GP2 race winner Karun Chandok, however, wisely announced earlier that he intends to stay another season in the feeder series. The team, under a different name, could very well be in someone else's hands by next year when Chandok is ready to take the leap. Ralf Schumacher, meanwhile, is said to have good relations with Mallya, but both parties played down the prospect of the German driver hitching up with the new team.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Zain @ Oct 22nd 2007 10:32PM
WTF? This is crazy! Couldn't he think of a better name? What next? Mallya Speed? Formula Vijay?
I'm not trying to belittle any Indians out here but for heaven's sake, F1 is all about evoking passion from the countless fans.
Zain @ Oct 22nd 2007 10:36PM
Btw, what happened to Sutil? If I'm not mistaken, he's set to be one of the drivers for the new team.
Patrick @ Oct 22nd 2007 10:51PM
This team will fail, just like Spyker, just like Midland and to a lessor extent Jordan before that.
I hate seeing these fly by the seat of your pants teams that fly in for a season or 2 before folding. There purpose is not to win but simply to get their brand name "out there".
I give this team 2 years tops.
hashiryu @ Oct 23rd 2007 12:07AM
He should have just sponsored A1 GP... WTF!!!!!
British teams like Williams, McLaren and Jordan have been in F1 for ages.... None of them were called Britain F1 or some bollocks like that.
Tactless move from somebody who should have more class.
moe6 @ Oct 23rd 2007 12:21AM
and now he's made sure no one will care other than india :P
skadebo @ Oct 23rd 2007 12:56AM
^- That'll be a billion people or so.
kellyp @ Oct 23rd 2007 1:20AM
um ever wonder why ferrari's are red, renualts are blue, mcllaren mercedes are silver and jaguars where green?
F1 is extremely nationalistic. just ask all the italians that are hung over today.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_international_auto_racing_colors
sujoy @ Nov 14th 2007 8:41AM
What is the point of ur post??? those colours have nothing to do with the national flags of their respective nationalities...
Quattrofan @ Oct 23rd 2007 2:09AM
Force India. Effing... hilarious. Always starting from the last grid, and hardly ever finishing in points if finishing at all. Force India, Yeah!
vectorbug @ Oct 23rd 2007 2:14AM
yoga fire!
Patrick @ Oct 23rd 2007 4:47AM
F-1 Force India whatever. I'm going to call them Fifi, as in Fido the dog and Fifi the cat.
Predictable quote: "... And on the final row, both of the Fifi cars as usual."
"A car's gone off! He'll be losing a lot of time with that. Oh it's a Fifi, nevermind. He's already three laps down."
I like Fifi as a nickname. They're just gonna be roadkill anyway.
Slo-Mo-Shun @ Oct 23rd 2007 5:44AM
The technical term here is actually mobile chicanes =P, you're not allowed to run over others in F1 (as much as Yamamoto would've liked on Fisi in Brazil)
jim @ Oct 23rd 2007 5:04AM
They could use the Team America song as their anthem. India .... FCUK YEAH! ..... lets hope their driving is better than their call centres
SuperSkyline89 @ Oct 23rd 2007 7:58AM
I don't know if anyone here has actually been to India, my family is from there so I have(I'm a Canadian Citizen though). All I have to say is that if the team's drivers are anything like the locals, the races will be a huge disaster. In India, if your in a truck, you have the right of way, period. If you see a truck coming in the opposite direction, you get the hell out of the way or your dead, its that simple. Another thing, here in North America the bigger a vehicle is the slower it is on the roads (in general, not always). It's totally different in India, their versions of public transit buses are the fastest things on the road followed by the trucks. The cars are mostly the slowest things on the road besides those god damn rickshaws and farmers pulling carts.
paul34 @ Oct 23rd 2007 9:49AM
Actually, I am of Indian heritage too - and if anything, I'd say an Indian driver from India has a slightly good chance... I mean, you've been there, and you know how much taking a drive there is taking your life into your hands, so if they can drive a car on a road barely wide enough for a lorry (one way), on the side of a high mountain with fog and no crash guard rails at speed, then they might do okay in F1 =p
ello @ Oct 23rd 2007 10:13AM
Well I have never been to India but here in NJ is a huge Indian population and all I know is that as a whole they can't drive for s**t. Driving skills and knowledge of road rules is non-existant, they all think that they have a right of way wherever they go.
SuperSkyline89 @ Oct 23rd 2007 11:23AM
ello,
I know what you mean, I live 20 minutes west of Toronto and there is a huge Indian population here. I can't even pretend to say that they drive good. They are either fast as hell and weaving around like idiots or 10km/h under the limit. Once I was parked in front of the CIBC (It's a really big Canadian Bank) waiting for my dad to come out. So I parked behind a couple of parked cars (but I didn't get out in case they needed to leave). Some Indian guy was parked like 4 meters ahead of me, he was backing out his tiny little Chevy Tracker. He backed out with at least enough space to drive a car behind him then looked at me like I was in his way. This idiot couldn't just back out all the way like a normal person? I should have said something to him but it never came across my mind at the time.
Pat @ Oct 23rd 2007 11:47AM
The driving argument can be applied to any nation, region or city!
It's not just Indians who drive like Yahoos in Toronto.
When I was younger we said the same thing about most asian drivers and we all thought Quebeckers were reckless speed demons.
Yet Québec drivers say the same thing about Ontario drivers ...
It's easy to be a biggot (myself included)
GeeDougg @ Oct 23rd 2007 5:05AM
To go from having a name like "Spyker" to a name like "Force India" is cosmically idiotic.... And to kellyp: not all F1 teams are nationalistic. At least as far as I know, the Germans aren't (and maybe they're not allowed to be in the Nazi world we live in).... Besides, I think if they'd used India's national colours as opposed to adopting a ludicrously unimaginative and classless moniker, non-Indian F1 fans of the team in question would be a lot happier.
Pat @ Oct 23rd 2007 6:44AM
If an American team was named Team America most of you would be bowing in front of the flag and chanting God Bless America.