OCTOBER 5, 2005

New team is not Direxiv

The new Honda-supplied Formula 1 team remains a mystery for the moment but it has emerged that the plans are not related to those being made by the Japanese firm Direxiv, which is rumoured to be negotiating to work with McLaren, using the old McLaren factory in Woking. Our spies tell us that the old premises are now being prepared for a new operation but there are no details as to who is involved as we have heard conflicting reports about the Japanese bid and the original Dubai-based project.

Japanese sources say that the new team appears to be structured around Takuma Sato and that the bid is from serious people. It seems that the team does have a strong Japanese base, which lead to the belief that it probably involves an organisation such as Dome, although there will obviously need to be a European operation as well and there has been speculation that this could be managed by Trevor Carlin. However at the moment the details of the new team remain a secret.