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Sunday at Spa, September the eleventh, could well be the day when Paul Stoddart reveals that his Minardi F1 team has been sold to Red Bull. According to solid speculation in Belgium, the deal was done on Friday afternoon, even though the rumour mill's 6pm official buyout announcement never occurred.
It is now reported that Dietrich Mateschitz - not a regular in the Paddock - and right-hand-man Dany Bahar, will arrive at Spa Francorchamps on Saturday evening, possibly to let the cat out of the bag sometime Sunday.
Stoddart admitted that some sort of announcement 'could be' made in the Belgian Ardennes, "but my gut feeling is that it's more likely closer to Brazil," he told the Autosport website. "I would miss it unbelievably ... but the team is more important than any individual," the Australian added.
f1racing.net
This will probably be the end of Minardi. :( An eara ends here. Minardi was just doing so well. What will be the concequence for F1? Team USA is not allowed to race Red Bull and Red Bull isn't allowed to race Ferrari. Michelins next year? And another team on Bernies side now.
What I can't understand is why would someone go to all the expense to buy out and ruin a historical F1 team, branding it a cheesey name like 'Team USA' to advertise an energy drink in a country that has an almost non-existant fan base for the category which that team races in? :rolleyes:
That's the next thing. we have absolutely no idea what their plans are. the team usa thing is just sucked out of somebody's pen because he said he wanted to do that with jaguar or had similar plans with dobbie.
Brooksey, "branding it a cheesey name like 'Team USA' to advertise an energy drink in a country that has an almost non-existant fan base for the category which that team races in?"
Red Bull has been losing market share in the US to the rash of Energy drinks sprouting up from the likes of Pepsi. It's fits with their long term plan to increase sales and awareness with the USA driver search. Nascar makes tons of $$$ just on the merchandising. The GDP of the US is pretty damn high and it''s a good market. With a US driver and a Team USA it would probably start to get alot of airplay... that's advertsing that cannot be purchased right now. The sponsers who might jump on the bandwagon boggles the mind. F1 getting popular int he US market has all the pieces in place. Memories of Mario, his grandson racing... the recent big hit with Danica at Indy in an open wheeel race. Just from the marketing standpoint Red Bull could has a great deal! It works on so many different levels! If paul only got $35M for it and no back end buy out or revenue stream he could be pretty sad in the future. I suspect the real money is yet to come.
...and with money comes technolgy and team support! Also by branding it as TEAM USA it means Minardi is not relagated to a back-bencher postion beihind red bull. We won't have to get TIOT reject tyres for example. Dang, the more I think about it the more postive possibilities come out....
Comments
This will probably be the end of Minardi. :( An eara ends here. Minardi was just doing so well.
What will be the concequence for F1? Team USA is not allowed to race Red Bull and Red Bull isn't allowed to race Ferrari. Michelins next year?
And another team on Bernies side now.
"branding it a cheesey name like 'Team USA' to advertise an energy drink in a country that has an almost non-existant fan base for the category which that team races in?"
Red Bull has been losing market share in the US to the rash of Energy drinks sprouting up from the likes of Pepsi. It's fits with their long term plan to increase sales and awareness with the USA driver search. Nascar makes tons of $$$ just on the merchandising. The GDP of the US is pretty damn high and it''s a good market. With a US driver and a Team USA it would probably start to get alot of airplay... that's advertsing that cannot be purchased right now. The sponsers who might jump on the bandwagon boggles the mind. F1 getting popular int he US market has all the pieces in place. Memories of Mario, his grandson racing... the recent big hit with Danica at Indy in an open wheeel race. Just from the marketing standpoint Red Bull could has a great deal! It works on so many different levels! If paul only got $35M for it and no back end buy out or revenue stream he could be pretty sad in the future. I suspect the real money is yet to come.
...and with money comes technolgy and team support! Also by branding it as TEAM USA it means Minardi is not relagated to a back-bencher postion beihind red bull. We won't have to get TIOT reject tyres for example. Dang, the more I think about it the more postive possibilities come out....
But, the proff will be in the pudding.