Dave Richards states that Subaru’s decision to pull out of the 2009 WRC was due to a ’sudden downturn in their business’

SWRT team director Dave Richards has stated to the BBC that the reason Subaru made their decision to pull out of the WRC was due to a sudden downturn in their business.

Speaking to BBC Radio 5 Live Richards stated:

We had an urgent call for a meeting over the weekend. 

Despite the fact that we have entered the championship for next year and were actually testing last week in Spain, Subaru just felt the sudden downturn in their business was so dramatic that they had to make some quick decisions."

 

Prodrive has stated that it will be looking to redeploy staff  from the WRC programme, which accounts for around 20% of the company's turnover.

Prodrive chairman Richards confessed that he would now have more time to think about a possible Formula 1 programme and said that the radical cost-cutting measures, which were announced by the sport's governing body last week, made a move into F1 more "realistic".

News report of Subaru's withdrawal from the WRC

Source: BBC 

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