Crowdfund my ass: Caterham fires all employees same day it announces fundraising success.

I wonder how many of those who sent money to Caterham feel like they have been played today?

On the same day the British team triumphantly announced it had met its crowdfunding goal and would be show up at the season finale in Abu Dhabi, it appears they fired all employees at the factory in the UK.  Not only was the entire workforce sacked but they were let go being owed the last seven weeks salary.

“It is dismaying to see the amount of publicity surrounding the success of the crowdfunding on the same day that there entire workforce was made redundant while owed seven weeks salary. The cynic in me would suggest that the two are not unrelated and the good news has served as a convenient opportunity to bury the bad news. If this is the case then it seems to have worked as there hasn’t been a peep anywhere"

That is an excerpt from an email sent to Joe Saward by a "former" Caterham F1 employee,  you can read the rest here

The reason Caterham desperately wanted to go to Abu Dhabi is because if they don't sow up they will forfeit any funds owed to them as part of the Concorde agreement,  The owners are in debt and they need any money to put a dent in those debts.  But by firing all their employees they are in effect killing the team.

Now my question is a simple one: if they fired all their employees, who is going to unpack everything and put tires on the cars?

More embarrassment for Formula 1.

Oh man, Caterham is hoping to crowdfund the rest of their F1 season!

At £10 a head that would be 235000 fans?   I feel for all the Caterham F1 employees but, good luck with that.

Press Release:

CATERHAM F1 TEAM LAUNCHES #REFUELCATERHAMF1: A CHANCE TO CROWDFUND THE TEAM'S RETURN FOR THE SEASON FINALE IN ABU DHABI

Friday 7 November 2014

The Caterham F1 Team is launching the #RefuelCaterhamF1 project today in order to power the team to go racing in Abu Dhabi and hopefully beyond. The team will reward both fans and sponsors in this unique opportunity to be the driving force behind the team by crowdfunding its return to the grid.

Companies and fans can get involved by heading to the Crowdcube website, www.crowdcube.com/caterham, and pledging the amount they wish to give, from just £10. Supporters will receive unique rewards, including a once in a lifetime opportunity to get your name on the Caterham F1 car competing in the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. The opportunity to support Caterham F1’s return to the grid will close when it reaches its £2.350m funding target or Friday 14 November, whichever is sooner.

Finbarr O’Connell, Caterham Sports Limited administrator and interim Caterham F1 Team Principal: “We are working non-stop to get the Caterham F1 Team back racing, initially in Abu Dhabi, but hopefully that will be just a stepping stone to get it back racing on a permanent basis, under new ownership. In order to achieve that one of our most useful, innovative and effective options right now is crowdfunding. We want to get as many sponsors and fans as possible involved this week and make our comeback something we can all be part of. This team deserves a future and I’m sure that there are plenty of fans and companies out there that agree with us, so I can’t think of a better way to get us all together and show our support to the team than this one, the Caterham F1 Team #RefuelCaterhamF1 project.

“In order to make this happen, we’ve teamed-up with Crowdcube, the world’s leading crowdfunding platform, which has raised £45m for more than 150 organisations since 2011. If we don’t hit the target by next Friday, obviously the pledged funds will be returned, but right now we are hopeful for the future of the team and we are confident that the team showing the world that it can race again will lead to a bright future under a new owner on a proper financial footing.”

Mike Stubbs of Mishcon, legal adviser to the Administrator: “At Mishcon, we do a lot of ground breaking work for our F1 clients and for all clients . This initiative represents yet another advancement in the ever growing list of rescue options if you are prepared to think laterally.”

Darren Westlake, CEO of Crowdcube: “It's fantastic for Crowdcube to be able to support an iconic team in this way; helping Caterham F1 to continue doing what it does best. This is a unique opportunity for motorsport fans to be directly involved in the sport they love, getting behind the team and playing a part in powering them onto the grid - even putting their name on the car.”

Lotterer in the spotlight

Not Jean Claude Van Damme

If the new management at Caterham plan was for headlines, they are winning big time.  After new Spa aero package, today comes news Kamui Kobayashi is being sacked (at least for one race) in favor of Andre Lotterer in Belgium.

Lotterer gets a second chance at F1, he used to be a test driver at Jaguar twelve years ago but was passed over in favor of Webber and the incomparable Antonio Pizzonia.   Jaguar F1 was soon after sold to a certain energy drink manufacturer.

Usually, it's F1 drivers who go to Sports cars, not the other way around but I guess with F1 taking on more and more of Endurance characteristics, who knows...

Cosmetic rhinoplasty.

Sometimes a nose job is needed to improve  breathing, most of the time it's a cosmetic procedure meant to improve looks.

A birdy told us a new, more conventional looking Caterham nose, to debut at Spa this week end,  performed worse than the old, weird looking one in the wind tunnel.

But the new management at Caterham wants something new, to signal change if anything so they got a new nose.   Given the team's rather disastrous results under Tony Fernandez's leadership, why not?   Frankly, Caterhams have been so bad it might be hard to tell.

In the end, cosmetics may indeed be as useful to the team as aerodynamics as it seeks to attract sponsorship for the future.

Lotus night also be seen in practice sessions with a conventional nose as it prepares for next year when its forked nose will not be allowed.

7 Sandwich

There's an obvious risk in claiming a link with Formula One when your F1 cars are perennially fighting for the last two spots on the grid but, in the case of Caterham, it's obvious they know how to make one car very, very well,  the 7.
The 7 is the evolution of Colin Chapman's late 1950's design, meaning Caterham scoff at Porsche for changing design too often.

So it should come as no surprise that ,when it came time to release a new "concept" car, the first new design since...1957.  what they ended up doing is taking a Caterham CSR and sandwich it between two slices of bodywork.

Shocker

Hurricane Sandy is beating us up pretty bad here in New York,  while we get back up to speed enjoy these videos about suspensions and shocks  courtesy of Caterham and Dyson Racing

From Track Day to F1: The Caterham SP/300.R

You could make a good case Caterham is the most hardcore car company out there.  After all,  the guys from Surrey loved a 1957 Lotus 7 design so much that in the 1970's they purchased the right to continue manufacturing it for the past 50 years.

in 2012, Caterham  finds itself arguably the winner in the Lotus vs Team Lotus debacle of 2010-11.  Now in F1, Caterham is maybe more Lotus than Lotus is Lotus because Lotus is a Renault...

F1 related confusion aside, Radical will get some cross shopping competition from the Lola designed Caterham SP/300.R.   Limited production and quite expensive, the SP 300 R is aimed at track day heroes.

With a spec series in the works, the 300.r  should attract racers to Caterham's motorsport ladder in the future.   The Tony Fernandes owned company has launched the Caterham Academy to provide a path from karting to, potentially, F1.

Power is from a Supercharged 2.0L Dry sump Ford, 300hp  with 35 extra hp available "Push to pass" , (presumably to dispatch pesky track day traffic).

0-60 in 2.8 seconds,  top speed 290 km/h -180 mph.

More to the point, 545 kg-1200 lbs  with 445kg-990lb downforce at 150mph.

What does it look like from the inside?  Exciting I'd say.




Photos courtesy Caterham Italia after the jump

How well do you drive?

CG found the top video on Rennlist, the bottom comes from an Italian forum, both shot around the same time in November. Top one has rain in the first part of the track and not as wet on the other side, typical conditions there it seems. Driver is Andre de Vries.

The bottom one was shot after some light snow had fallen, it's slower but then again, it's a Caterham r500 on R-comp tires. I would think keeping it off the aarmco is an accomplishment enough!

So, how well do you drive?



end of post

Cars I'd like to drive one day, part XXVII...

Tell me this does not look like a fun challenge: a Caterham R500 on a cold december day, 265hp, 1100 lbs... track is not crowded and there are no safety nazis warning giving you "excess of oversteer" warnings.

Clip is from Italy's Track4Fun.com, trackday organizers and now also official Caterham importers. Great commercial for your product guys!





And...yes It doesn't always work out perfectly.... and it certainly isn't the fast way around, but it sure looks fun.

Upside Down Stig

With all the excitement over the "unmasking" of the Stig, let me remind you the Axis feels The Stig is not a person but a state on mind.

With that let's take a look at this clip our friend, Upside Down Stig sent us. We are at Eastern Creek, a beautiful track just outside of Sydney and our Antipodean Stiggy has had a qualifying issue. He finds himself tenth on the grid...



(Stig Richards)



home

It takes some nerve...

It takes a lot of nerve to race with a name like Stig Richards.

But perhaps it takes even more nerve to race a Caterham without a full cage, on the Mount Panorama track in Bathurst, on slicks, in the rain.

Aussie Stiggy here gets a bad start but stick around, he does OK in the end!

Stig writes:

"If you live in a drought affected area I think we have a solution. Gather around 30 Clubman cars and organise a race.

Just as we head out to the grid the predictive powers of the Bureau of Meteorology will collapse, clouds will gather like a scene from a sci-fi movie and as the lights go green the heavens will open, reaching the ground about two minutes later.

We will be on slicks, have had next to no experience of the track but rest assured we will enjoy ourselves immensely.

In this race I made the wrong decision at turn one and didn't have the momentum or power to keep my place up Mountain Straight.

I chopped out a couple of laps in the middle but essentially the video starts with me going backwards and then follows my quest to regain some spots.

Enjoy

Stig"

Catch more of "Stig Richards" here

Tiff does the Renault R26.R

...I guessing even a hotter Caterham would not have done much better in those conditions. In any case Mr.Needell likes the Renault track day special!

As it turns out, our friends at RSR Nürburg just announced they have added a Renault R26.R to their rental fleet starting March 1st.    The ultimate hot hatch on the ultimate track,  perfect!

Home

Tracktard car test

Five cars you could move to the UK and legally commute in depending on your tolerance for looking like a dork, driving with a helmet on the street.

Autocar comes to a foregone conclusion in this test of vehicles which loosely fall under the category of "cars". Looks like two brilliant, one great, one "eh" and one joke....

• Ariel Atom
• Brooke 260 Double-R
  
• Caterham Superlight R-400
• Elfin MS-8 Clubman
  
• Lotus 2-Eleven

Tracktard's holiday from AxisOfOversteer.com and Vimeo.

How many lessons can be learned?

How many lessons can be learned from the very scary crash video?

Spa, Belgium October 2005. The info from the video is that someone dumped coolant at the exit of the infamous Eau Rouge complex. It's the cool down lap....



download


* Cool down does not mean "brain off", the guy in the green Caterham goes hard on the power with his outside wheel on the painted curb when you can see the dumped coolant fairly clearly. Spilled coolant is vicious.

* Cool down means you need to dial it back, not slow to a crawl but neither use the lap as your last chance to pound the car like the numbnutz unfortunate guy in the silver typeR (or is it a Civic?) cresting Eau Rouge at the limit.

* If you crash...stay in your car! The guy in the Caterham could easily have gotten killed after surviving the crash, the silver sedan smashes into him as he is getting out of his wreck.

* Not having corner workers for track days is just insane, at the very minimum there should be light signals. At our most recent Watkins Glen week end I got to see in action the flashing yellow traffic light type signals for the first time. Let me tell you, you DON'T miss those, no way. A truly great safety feature.

Keep it shiny!

UPDATE: an alert but anonymous reader points out that in fact it was an open track day so the "cool down" really applies to the Caterham alone. However I think the lessons still apply.